Farmers Movement Archive

Poor infra to blame for surge, not us: Farmers

Tribune News ServiceRohtak, May 14Hitting back at Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar for his remarks that the farmers’ protest is responsible for a spike in Covid cases in rural areas, protesting farmers at Tikri and farm organisations alleged the government intended to sabotage the protest through these baseless statements.But the farmers are firm on not moving from Delhi borders until the three farm laws are repealed.“We condemn the CM’s remarks. The governments at the Centre and in the state have failed to control the Covid and people are losing their loved ones due to poor health infrastructure,” said Phool Singh Sheokand, state president, All India Kisan Sabha (AIKS).‘Like Tablighis, govt defaming farmers’Earlier, the state had defamed the Tablighi Jamaat for the Covid spread. Now, it is defaming farmers. People working in Delhi, Gurugram and Faridabad, who visit their villages, could be the reason behind the spike. —Gurnam Charuni, BKU leaderSumit, working secretary of the AIKS, said if the protest was responsible for the spread of Covid, why infection was rampant in states where the farmers’ movement was negligible. “The CM must explain the factors behind the surge in cases in other states,” he added.Inderjit Singh, a senior member of the Samyukt Kisan Morcha, said how could the CM make such a baseless statement when the death of no farmer camping on the Delhi borders had been reported due to Covid in the past five months.Gurbaksh Singh, a protesting farmer at Tikri, said the Chief Minister intended to scare the farmers by making such illogical statements so that they start moving from the borders but the farmers had vowed not to go back home without getting their demands met.

The Tribune

2021-05-15