Farmers Movement Archive

Arhtiyas strike work against recent raids, claim it ac act to scare

Ludhiana: The arhtiyas (commission agents) of Ludhiana district remained on strike on Monday as a mark of protest against the recent raids conducted by the investigation wing of the income tax department on several of them in the state. Mentioning that the central government was resorting to scare tactics, a five-member delegation of arhtiyas will leave for Singhu border to decide about the future course of action in consultation with the farmers. Several questions have been raised on this action by the commission agents of the state, in addition to terming this to be an act to scare them to back out of farmers’ agitation. Some of the businessmen are of the view that use of CRPF raises suspicion that this action was conducted at the behest of the central government. Meanwhile, the farmers protesting at the borders of Delhi have extended full support to the arhtiyas and termed the action unjustified. They have warned the IT department and the central government that if any further action or any other raid is conducted on arhityas of Punjab, then farmers will not let this happen and gherao the department officials. Meanwhile, the commission agents have decided to go on strike from December 22 till December 25 at some mandis. Ever since Monday morning, the shops and offices of arhtiyas located in various mandis of the district remained closed. Though the local commission agents and office-bearers of the associations of arhtiyas refused to say anything on their agitation, while speaking to TOI, Amarjit Singh Brar, senior vice president, Federation of Arhitya Associations, Punjab, said, “The farmers’ agitation has turned into a ‘jan andolan’ and every Punjabi is making his contribution for this cause. In same way the arhtiyas are supporting this agitation, so that the farmers can get back their rights. The recent action by the income tax department on the arhtiyas seems to have been planned to deter us from supporting the farmers as there is no point conducting raids on us since all of us file income tax returns and comply with the law.” Brar added that, “But in spite of this, the IT department and the central government indulged in pick-and-choose policy and after pin-pointing some prominent arhtiya leaders of every mandi they indulged in scaring tactics by conducting raids on us by sending more than 150 officers and para-military force personnel to each arhtiya’s office. The Centre cannot deny its involvement in this as the IT department use CRPF personnel were involved in this action when otherwise they usually use local police force if required.” He further said, “Moreover, the CRPF personnel had come in vehicles with UP numbers, whereas normally the vehicles should have Delhi number if the forces were called all of sudden. This clearly shows that this was a planned operation, which had full backing of the Centre and was only aimed at terrorising us. But both arhtiyas and farmers are brothers in arms and we will not withdraw our support to the farmers. All major farmer associations too have been calling us ever since they heard about this misadventure of the IT department. Along with declaring that any further IT action on arhtiyas will be met with full resistance by farmers, they have also called our delegation to decide our future course of action and a five-member team of ours will be going to Singhu border to finalise it after consulting the farmer associations. Meanwhile, arhtiyas all over Punjab will be on strike till December 25.”

The Times of India

2020-12-22

Ludhiana