New Delhi: Refusing to budge, Bhartiya Kisan Union leader Rakesh Tikait said on Tuesday that the farmers’ agitation may continue till October as the protesters are not going to return home until the three controversial agricultural reform laws are withdrawn by the government.
Soon after a delegation of Shiv Sena MPs, led by Sanjay Raut, met Mr Tikait at the Ghazipur border, the BKU leader said: “Our slogan is –‘kanoon wapsi nahi, to ghar wapsi nahi’ (Will not go back home until the laws are withdrawn). This agitation will not end before October… it will not end anytime soon.”
Speaking about the Republic Day violence, Mr Tikait claimed that the youth who hoisted the Sikh flag at the Red Fort had been allowed there by the authorities. “All this was done to malign the image of the Punjabi community and paint the image of farmers as anti-national,” he added.
The Samyukta Kisan Morcha, an umbrella organisation of the protesting farmers’ unions, said there can be no “formal” talks with the government until the “harassment” by the police and administration stops and all the detained farmers are released.
A public interest litigation plea seeking a judicial inquiry into the cases relating to the Republic Day violence will come up before the Supreme Court Wednesday. The Delhi high court has already directed the Centre and the police to take action in accordance with the law on the FIRs filed in connection with the violence.
As the protest sites at Delhi’s borders are being fortified by the police with steel coils and cement barriers, the farmers claim the “war-like” preparations are an attempt to scare the protesters away and turn locals against them.
A large number of the protesting farmers, meanwhile, turned up at toll plazas on the national highways in Haryana. At the Landhri toll plaza, the farmers vowed to wage a long battle against the three agri laws. The protesters also blocked the Patiala-Jind-Rohtak-Delhi national highway to oppose the Internet restrictions in some parts of the state.
The Samyukta Kisan Morcha also alleged that the increased barricading, including digging trenches, fixing nails on roads, setting up barbed wire fences, closing of internal roads, stopping of internet services and “orchestrating protests through BJP-RSS workers” are part of the “attacks” being organised by the government, police and administration against the farmers.
At an all-party meet in Chandigarh, Punjab CM Capt. Amarinder Singh said it was painful to see the farmers losing lives while fighting for their rights. Cutting across party lines, the leaders tried to evolve a consensus on taking an all-party delegation to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
AAP leader Bhagwant Mann demanded the setting up of a help desk at the Delhi border. He said the AAP government in Delhi would help the Punjab CM in case he decided to station himself in the national capital to mobilise political parties in support of the farmers’ agitation.
