Amidst Water Cannons And Tear Gas Farmers Parade To Delhi

Farmers protest stride to Delhi

The farmers protesting against the Union’s new farm laws under their two day 'Delhi Chalo' movement are inching towards Delhi. They are seen carrying woolens, rations, essential items in modified tractors and have moved from Haryana in the biting cold winter evening fearless of the barricades put up by police, water cannons and tear gas shells.

Two of the eminent farmers organisations Smayukt Kisan Morcha and All India Kisan Sangharsh Coordination Committee stated “It is expected that more than 50,000 farmers will be standing at Delhi border by today evening. The numbers are expected to swell through the night as thousands of tractors and trolleys are carrying farmers, women and children from interior areas of Punjab”. In the midst of the cold wave water cannons started at full pace at midnight as the police in Haryana's Sonipat tried to scatter the farmer groups who were trying to move towards the capital

This morning the Punjab farmers who were sealed at the Haryana border since yesterday have started their march and most of them have reached Haryana’s Karnal. Despite police crackdown most of them have managed to reach Panipat but have been stopped by the police halfway.

A gathering of more than 2000 farmers in Uttar Pradesh has been stopped at Rampur. The government of Uttar Pradesh restricted them from moving towards Delhi and together now they are waiting at the Nainital-Delhi highway to be allowed to move forward.

The marching of the farmers to Delhi is from six states and the protests which were planned over six months have the support of 500 farmer’s organizations.

Many opposition leaders, opposition parties and activists have taken to twitter and tweeted about the ongoing protest and expressed their anguish. Delhi CM, Arvind Kejriwal stated that holding peaceful protests is a constitutional right. Rahul Gandhi of the Indian National Congress said that the country’s farmers have stood firmly in dissent “against the brutality of the Modi government”. Priyanka Gandhi Vadra tweeted “Instead of listening to the voice of the farmers who are protesting the law, that snatched the support price from them, the BJP government uses water cannons to disperse them in cold weather. Everything is being taken away from the farmers while the capitalists are being given away banks railway stations and loan waiver”.

Punjab CM, has questioned the Government of Haryana “don’t farmers have the right to pass peacefully through the public highway”. The CPIM also tweeted against the police aggression on the farmers with tear gas and water cannons and fully condemned it. The chief of Swaraj India, Yogendra Yadav leading a team of farmers was detained by Haryana Police at Gurugram.

Agriculture Minister Narendra Singh Tomar's appeal for negotiation talks with the farmer on December 3 have received no response. He said “The government is committed for the welfare of the farmers and we are ready for talks whether it is about minimum support price or infrastructure we are ready for discussion”.

The farmers and the opposition assert that the new farm laws could lead to the government stopping the system of buying grains at guaranteed prices, this would then leave the farmers only at the pity of the corporates.