Farmers to march to Delhi for two-day protest on Thursday

Farmers from a number of States will march to Delhi on Thursday to demand the repeal of the three Central farm Acts which they describe as “pro-corporate and anti-farmer” and also the withdrawal of the Electricity (Amendment) Bill 2020.

Addressing a press conference here on Tuesday, leaders of farmer groups affiliated to the All India Kisan Sangarsh Coordination Committee (AIKSCC) and others, said their protests will continue beyond the two-day Delhi Chalo programme till the Centre accedes to their demands.

AIKSCC urged farmers from all over India to march to Delhi to press for their demands. They appealed to other sections of society to step forward and support anna daatas’ legitimate demand for their interests to be protected and cooperate with the farmers’ programme.

The protest in the capital will witness tens of thousands of farmers coming from neighbouring States of Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh. Hundreds of farmers are already on their way from Karnataka, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh, the AIKSCC leaders said.

The National Working Group of AIKSCC condemned the attack and arrest of several farmer and trade union leaders by the Haryana BJP government since Monday night. “Such repression will only embolden the farmers’ struggle as it is a life and death question for them,” the leaders said.

AIKSCC has also condemned governments’ attempts to use the Covid-19 pandemic to thwart the democratic right of citizens to protest against anti-people policies. It criticised the Centre for deliberately hyping up the Covid-19 threat to promote and protect the interests of big corporates and multinational firms. “Covid-19 care requires several medical and preventive steps, like distribution of masks, sanitisers, physical care of the needy and jobless, etc where GOI (Government of India) performance is woefully wanting. The government has rather imposed policing and fines which are counter-productive and meant to blame people and demoralise them,” it said.

While poor government response to Covid is impacting various sections of our people, the three black farm Acts and Electricity Bill 2020 will ruin entire generations of Indian farmers by handing over control over farming, marketing and food supply chains to agri-businesses, the farmer leaders alleged.

Newly elected 16 Left MLAs in Bihar plan to protest outside the Legislative Assembly on Thursday. Additionally, dharnas and demonstrations are planned at most of block headquarters in every district of Bihar on these two days. Similarly, farmers have decided to organise a grameen hartal in many States including, Andhra Pradesh, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Odisha, Telangana and West Bengal.