Farmers Movement Archive

Noida group moves SC against ‘so-called andolans’

NOIDA: Referring to the ongoing farmers’ agitation and the protest at Shaheen Bagh against the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) from December 2019 to March 2020, a Noida-based group has approached the Supreme Court to seek clear, unambiguous and transparent rules on “so-called andolans”. The petition filed by ‘Women on Making Nation’ demands strong punishment for these “so-called andolans” that have been “blocking roads, public places and parks for months together”. Mentioning the farmers’ protest at Delhi’s borders, which began in the last week of November 2020, and the Shaheen Bagh sit-in, the petition has urged the court to take into consideration why going on ‘andolans’ at public places and on the busiest of roads had of late become “a trend”. “That the design of these andolans are almost similar on one or the other way like blocking of roads, making anti-government slogans… obstructing day-to-day activities of taxpayers or the common citizen thereby indulging in anti-establishment activities on the ulterior motive to gain mileage in political field (sic),” reads the petition, adding the “hidden agenda of these agitations was to defame the government as well as the country”. Monicca Agarwaal, who works with an IT company and identifies herself as the president of the group, told TOI it would take her a maximum of 20-25 minutes to go from Sector 63 in Noida to Connaught Place in Delhi, which has increased to an hour now because of blockades due to the farmers’ protest. Besides wastage of time and money, she contends, this amounts to mental torture coupled with harassment and fear and affects women who “have to manage between home and office”. Talking about the farmers’ protest, Agarwaal told TOI, “It has surpassed 120 days and they have threatened to die of suicide. This is no way. I don’t know what problem they have but I am talking only about my problem. There may be many like me who have a problem. It is painful that you are not thinking about the country and citizens, whether it is the government or farmers.” BKU-Tikait, one of the groups spearheading the farmers’ protests, said many efforts had been made to defame the farmers’ agitation and this was no different. Spokesperson Pawan Khatana said, “Earlier too, such petitions have been filed. We have not blocked the road.” The farmers have been on a sit-in protest against the three new central farming laws, which they want repealed, at the Singhu, Tikri and Ghazipur borders after they were stopped from entering the capital by Delhi Police. News agency ANI reported on Tuesday that the Supreme Court had sought a response from the Centre and the Delhi Police commissioner on the petition.

The Times of India

2021-04-01

Noida