Farmers Movement Archive

On 100th Day, Spirit Still High At Singhu

New Delhi: It has been 100 days since Singhu Border became home to thousands of protestors demanding that the central government scrap three new farm laws enacted last September. There weren’t as many of the farmers at the site on Saturday, but the spirit of the protest hadn’t quite died down. Baldev Singh, 82, who came to Singhu in November last year, grandly said that the number of days of protest did not matter. “Even if we sit here for 500 days but our demands are not met, we will not budge,” the octogenarian said ominously. TOI spoke to some of the protesters who recalled their first day at the protest site in November, after which they have lost more than a hundred fellow farmers, weathered police action, fended political pressure, found ways to cope with living in the open and organised rallies to make their voices heard across the globe. Harjinder Singh, 62, said that no matter how long it took the central government to concede their demands, the protesting farmers would not be deterred. “There are seven people in my family who are here at the protest site,” he said. “More people will be joining us in a couple of days. Since the weather is turning hot now, many people have returned to the village to make arrangements for a comfortable stay at Singhu in the coming months. We need coolers and rations, and they will bring these from the villages.” Satnam Singh, 77 who has spent 99 days at Singhu border, disclosed that his wife was taking care of the farm in this absence, his son being in Canada for studies. “I make a video call to them every day. And while I would like to be with them, the desire is not tempting enough to make me leave the protest,” smiled the septuagenarian. “We have lost so many of our fellow protestors. How can we let their sacrifices go to waste?” In August last year, after their attempt to block railway tracks in Punjab during the discussion of the farm bills in Parliament did not get much traction, the farmers planned to descend on the capital on November 26. They were, however, stopped at the borders and have been at these crossings since then, blocking some major entry points into Delhi at Singhu, Ghazipur, Chilla and Tikri. Within a few days of that, thousands had arrived at Singhu with their family members, including children and the elderly. Their tractor trolleys ferried food for months. There were around five lakh protestors on the borders of Delhi, who had no intention of returning to their villages until the three agricultural laws were repealed. Their tractor rally on January 26 almost sent the campaign into disarray, but they retrieved the situation quickly. On Saturday, the milling throngs of earlier days were missing, there were fewer langars too. But no matter the size of the crowd, the farmers’ intent didn’t appear to have weakened.

The Times of India

2021-03-07

Delhi