Finding protesting farmers on the backfoot a day after violence in Delhi, the Haryana Police have initiated efforts to operationalise toll plazas throughout the nationwide highways within the state. For the previous one month, farmers have ensured free passage to autos at nearly all toll plazas on highways within the state.
Given the change in circumstances, authorities officers hinted that police will attempt to get the toll plazas purposeful quickly, however will keep away from any quick confrontation with the agitators.
To keep regulation and order, heavy police drive has been deployed at toll plazas. Meanwhile, farmer leaders at toll plazas mentioned they may comply with the choice taken by Sayunkat Kisan Morcha leaders in reference to lifting of dharnas from toll plazas.
Following instructions from Haryana DGP Manoj Yadava, cops Wednesday went to the dharna venues to speak to the farmers sitting on the toll plaza websites.
At the toll plaza close to Yamunanagar on the Chandigarh-Yamunanagar freeway, Yamunanagar SP Kamaldeep Goyal reached the dharna website within the afternoon and mentioned: “We will try to persuade farmers to lift their dharnas.”
A senior police officer mentioned, “We have appealed to the agitators that the dharnas which are going on at toll plazas for the past one month should end now. There is time for everything, the agitation can’t run indefinitely. A point has been made by farmers in favour of their demands. Violence has taken place Tuesday and an untoward incident can take place at the toll plazas too.”
“We always try to reach out to the persons concerned. It’s not like that the police only have dandas to use every time. They are farmers and ours is people’s police. Even for the smooth functioning of the Republic Day parade at district headquarters, we engaged them to not disturb national events. They listened to our point of view and did not disturb the parade anywhere. If the point of view is presented in the right perspective, then the people concerned respond,” added the officer.
At a toll plaza close to Barwala city on Chandigarh-Yamunanagar freeway, native farmer leaders, nevertheless, mentioned they won’t carry the dharna until a call is taken by the highest leaders of Sayunkat Kisan Morcha. A farmer, Darshan Singh, mentioned, “Our agitation will continue to save our land from corporates.”
A neighborhood farmer chief, Karamchand, added, “We condemn whatever violence happened at the Red Fort Tuesday. Those who indulged in the violence were not part of our unions. Those leading these groups were part of a conspiracy to defame our agitation.”
In the night, a gaggle of youths claiming to characterize “Hindu organisations” staged a protest at this dharna website. They got here on bikes and raised slogans like “Bharat Mata Ki Jai”. They additionally burnt an effigy of “Khalistan”.
“We have staged a protest against the insult of the national flag. Such incidents never happened at the Red Fort earlier,” mentioned a protester amongst them, Jitender Rana.
At the Ghraunda toll plaza on the Delhi-Ambala Highway (NH-44) close to Karnal, heavy police drive was deployed to stop a gathering whilst a langar (group kitchen) was being served.
A biker, Paramjeet Singh, 30, claimed that he was assaulted by a gaggle simply few km earlier than the toll plaza. This angered the farmers who had been transferring to Punjab from Delhi borders of their tractor-trolleys. However, the policemen assured them no person can be allowed to take regulation into their arms.
Since Tuesday afternoon, a lot of farmers — who had gone to affix the “tractor parade” — have returned to their villages in Punjab and Haryana. A these return journeys continued on Wednesday as properly, there was a site visitors jam like scenario at many locations on the nationwide freeway.
At the NH-44 close to Rai (Sonipat), farmers admitted that the Red Fort incident is an enormous setback for his or her agitation however hoped they might regain the energy quickly.
An activist of BKU (Doaba) from Punjab, Jasbir Singh, mentioned, “Our farmer unions failed to manage a large crowd. There was a lack of volunteers to guide the crowd apart from lack of communication. There was no clarity among the farmers till Monday late evening on what route had been finalised for tractor parade on Tuesday. All farmers could not be communicated about the final route till Tuesday morning. They followed the route as opted by those who were in the front line and who had hijacked the agitation. This was part of political conspiracy to defame farmers.”
A farmer from Shera village of Panipat, Om Prakash, 66, mentioned, “No doubt the Red Fort episode is a setback for us but farmers face such obstacles in their daily life. Farmers will face this challenge too and are determined to continue its fight as their land parcels are on stake this time.”
