Farmers Movement Archive

Delhi: Picking up pieces after farmers go for broke

NEW DELHI: The protesting farmers damaged railings on roads and flower pots on the medians during the tractor parade on Tuesday. PWD officials said that Delhi Police are helping them ascertain the damages. Most of these incidents were reported from Mukarba Chowk, Ghazipur, ITO, Seemapuri, Nangloi, Tikri border and Red Fort. Over 40 buses were also vandalised. At Mukarba Chowk, after clearing the barricades with tractors, the protesters damaged a few cranes. There were similar scenes at Nangloi where some vehicles were wrecked by the protesters A PWD official said iron railings at the medians and road grilles were damaged. “Delhi Police is giving us a list of places that were hit on Tuesday. Once we have a complete list, we will start carrying out repairs,” the official said. “Once our engineers see the damage, will we be able to ascertain the cost involved in repairing the same.” Sanjay Chaudhary, a tea seller at a location in Mukarba Chowk where the farmers and the police clashed on Tuesday, hurriedly shut his shop and fled the area. A day later when he returned, he was relieved to find his shop undamaged in the violence after the tractors refused to go to Sanjay Gandhi Transport Nagar. While Chaudhary was fortunate, the crane owners of the parking lot there were not. Lalit Kumar of Lalit Crane Service complained that when the violence erupted, he and the other crane owners had to flee. “Returning in the evening, we found our cranes all damaged.” Kumar said that there were 50 parked cranes, and their cubicles had been damaged. Vijay of Anshu Crane Services had given his crane to Delhi Police to place barricades on the road before the tractor rally. He received Rs500 a day for fuel. Republic Day brought new losses. “The windshield costs us around Rs3,500 and I spent over Rs8,000 today to get mine fixed,” he complained. At Nangloi Chowk a trolley used as a barricade against the marchers was overturned by the angry mob. A riot control vehicle was also damaged. At Peeragarhi, protesters broke the road railings and vandalised the advertising poles. Several police cars were also targeted. More than 40 public transport buses in Delhi were damaged by the protesting farmers who deviated from the permitted route for the tractor rally. According to sources, 38 Delhi Transport Corporation buses were damaged on Tuesday. Though DTC has a fleet of 3,762 buses, there are normally around 3,400 buses operating on the roads. Since Tuesday was a national holiday, there were fewer than normal DTC buses on the roads. “Only around 1,975 buses were working because the demand was expected to be low. Of these, 38 were damaged,” a source said, who added that only 900 buses were deployed in the evening following these incidents. An official of Delhi Integrated Multi-Modal Transit System, which oversees the bus Cluster Scheme, said “Five Cluster Scheme buses were damaged, three in Uttam Nagar, one near Akshardham and one at GTB Nagar. Their windshields were shattered.” A source added, “The buses should be back on the road after repairs. Despite route diversions and plans to avoid the border areas, some of the buses got caught in the protests, particularly at ITO.”

The Times of India

2021-01-28

Delhi