Cops Clear Farm Protest Sites

Punjab Police on Wednesday detained hundreds of farm leaders and demolished protest sites to dismantle a 13-month-long agitation by some agricultural groups at the Shambhu and Khanauri borders with Haryana, hours after talks between the cultivators and the government ended inconclusively.

- HT Correspondents

CHANDIGARH/KHANAURI/AMBALA:

Police detained several Samyukta Kisan Morcha (non-political) leaders, including Sarwan Singh Pandher and Jagjit Singh Dallewal, who began his indefinite hunger strike on November 26, 2024 at the Khanauri border demanding legal guarantee for minimum support price and an across-the-board debt waiver for farmers. He has consistently refused medical aid by the Punjab government.

Protester Guramneet Singh Mangat said the farm leaders were detained in Mohali while they were headed to the Shambhu protest site after the meeting with the delegation led by Union agriculture minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan. The talks—seventh since February last—ended in a deadlock, with the next meeting scheduled for May 4.

Hours later, bulldozers rolled on to the Shambhu (Shambhu-Ambala) and Khanauri (Sangrur-Jind) borders where hundreds of cultivators set up protest sites since last February.

"Today's action has been taken because we want the youth of Punjab to get employment. We want to open Shambhu and Khanauri borders. The demands of the farmers are against the central government and they should stage a protest in Delhi or somewhere else but should not block the roads of Punjab," said Punjab finance minister Harpal Singh Cheema, who represented the state in the talks.