Current affairs

From iron rods to sharp nails...How Delhi police are prepared to retaliate India's own farmers?

By alagu, 02 February, 2021
Delhi, Farmers, Farm Bills

What Delhi has been witnessing is the new grid of security mechanisms installed by the Delhi police, in what has become a fortress, to block the protesting farmers from entering Delhi. The mechanisms of multi-level barricades and unprecedented police deployment had got flayed by the activists and oppositions that the police had installed the measures as if it was India's border.

The tight grid of security was set up in Delhi following the untoward incidents and violence that erupted between the police and farmers during Republic Day. The clashes during Republic Day had happened when the peasants had carried out their Tractor Parade and when they tried entering Central Delhi. The farmers had stormed the Red Fort and intensely demanded the Center to repeal the three controversial farm laws, without which the farmers vowed that they will continue their protests.

Following the violence, the Delhi police had on Monday brought the major farmers' protest sites - Singhu, Tikri, and Ghazipur under their tight control by installing an unprecedented level of security to contain farmers' entry into the city. With the view of blocking farmers' entry, the Delhi police had installed the security grid by placing barricades, sharp nails, erecting barriers, installing iron rods, and deploying a massive number of security personnel. 

In Singhu border where the farmers are camped in large numbers, the workers deployed by the Delhi police were on Monday seen hooking the iron rods between the two rows of cement barriers on the flank of the main highway with the motive of curbing the movements of the protesting farmers into Delhi. They also had placed goods carrying wagons in the border and another portion of the highway at the Delhi-Haryana border was blocked and erected a cement wall. 

Ghazipur border between Delhi and Uttar Pradesh was filled with thousands of barricades and a heavy presence of police personnel including the personnel from the Provincial Armed Constabulary (PAC) and Rapid Action Force (RAF). The barricades in the border were swirled with the wired fences and the Delhi police had also installed cement blocks and barriers and brought the border under extensive surveillance, resembling the border of the country with its adversary. 

According to reports, apart from the barricades, barbed wire has been installed to restrict people moving on foot. The security grid in Tikri Border- which is one of the three protesting sites of farmers, was quite different as the police had installed multi-layers of barricades and cemented sharp and long nails on the road to prevent the movement of vehicles. The workers at the Tikri Border said that they had used sharp nails and iron rebars to puncture the tyres of the vehicles that enter the border without proper permission. 

The visuals from Delhi had shown how the law enforcement agency is prepared to barricade the farmers from entering Central Delhi. Thousands of farmers from across the country have been protesting against the three controversial farm laws passed by the Central government for over two months in the Delhi borders. The farmers staunchly demand the Center repeal the farm laws which they fear would dismantle the grounds of Minimum Support Price (MSP) and would pump in the private players into the agricultural sector. 

As part of their protests, farmers had conducted Tractor Parade on January 26, and earlier, they said that they would organize the march towards the Parliament on the Budget day- February 1st. However, they had canceled their march and the farmers had held a hunger strike on January 30, 2021. On the front of reaching an amicable resolution, there has been an incessant deadlock between the farmers and the Center as several rounds of talks had failed and let the impasse continue. 


 

 

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