Farmers Movement Archive

At home, Ranjit Singh gets hero’s welcome

NAWANSHAHR: Ranjit Singh (22), jailed farm activist who was arrested on January 29 and released on March 17, returned to a hero’s welcome to his native village, Kajampur, on Saturday. He was not just felicitated in his village, where hundreds had gathered from surrounding villages, but also on the way from Balachaur to Kazampur as people lined up to greet and honour him. Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, UK MP Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi, Canadian MP Jasraj Singh Hallan and British professional boxer Kell Brook, along with scores of several other prominent social media influencers, also tweeted his pictures. Gandhi, while tweeting Ranjit’s picture of police dragging him from his hair apart from the one with a policeman’s boot pressed against his face, wrote: “Modi government’s trademark – inhuman atrocities.” Ranjit was granted bail by a Delhi court on March 16 and was released on March 17, after which he was flown to Amritsar for paying obeisance at Darbar Sahib. Delhi Sikh Gurdwara Management Committee president Manjinder Singh Sirsa drove him from Delhi to Chandigarh on Saturday. For further journey, Ranjit was driven to his village from Chandigarh by former minster and Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) leader Bikram Singh Majithia in his vehicle with Sirsa, Ranjit’s uncle and brother. Scores of motorcycles and cars were part of the cavalcade which was stopped at quite a few places. Youth from surrounding villages waited for a few hours on the way. People showered flower petals on him. In Kazampur, he first went to the village gurdwara and then a function was held in the village to welcome him. Majithia and Sirsa also addressed the function and praised his courage and tenacity. They said Bathinda MP Harmirat Kaur Badal had shown his picture with a cop’s shoe on his face even in Parliament. Ranjit, in his brief address, thanked all and said he had no words to thank the people who supported him. Ranjit’s mother Sarabjit Kaur thanked DSGMC and Sirsa for their efforts to get him released and for continuously remaining in touch with the family and supporting them. Netizens question Yadav’s ‘apology’Till now, DSGMC has been in the spotlight for acquiring bail for farmers arrested on or after January 26, but now SAD has entered the equation with party MLA Bikram Singh Majithia joining Ranjit’s journey back home. Apart from hundreds of people from Ranjit’s village and surrounding villages, SAD leaders and workers participated in his welcome on Saturday. It seems that Sanyukta Kisan Morcha’s (SKM) initial criticism of Ranjit provided the space to DSGMC to champion his cause. In the last couple of days, scores of Punjabi netizens, including those who are critical of SAD, drew a contrast between the role DSGMC played in getting him released and the comments made by SKM leader Yogendra Yadav, in a video interview about him after the January 29 incident. Yadav, in the video, said he had apologised to the SHO who was injured on his arm and the “attack” on police was “very shameful”. The video has been shared widely and SKM leaders criticised by Punjabi netizens for “disowning” Ranjit. DSGMC president Manjider Singh Sirsa said police personnel who thrashed and tortured Ranjit at police station would also be taken to court. His viral photo: Boot to the faceA picture of Ranjit, taken before his arrest and which had gone viral, had a striking similarity to deceased US man Geroge Floyd’s picture which had sparked Black Lives Matter protests in the US. Both photos had a a cop’s boot to the face of the detainee. While Floyd had died, Ranjit, accused of attacking cops at the Kundli-Singhu border after a mob had started pelting stones at the farm protesters, was taken into custody and booked.

The Times of India

2021-03-21

Chandigarh