Soaring mistrust

The hunger strike by farmers' leader Jagjit Singh Dallewal has brought into sharp focus the tightrope challenges of balancing protests and governance in India.

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Dallewal's fast-unto-death, now in its 38th day, is symbolic of the frustration of farmers seeking basic assurances like a statutory guarantee on Minimum Support Price (MSP) for crops, a farm loan waiver, and the rejection of the Centre's draft National Policy Framework on Agricultural Marketing. Driven by a deepening agrarian distress in the country, these demands, it can be said, have not been received well by the governments—be it the state or the Centre.

The Supreme Court's directive to shift Dallewal to a hospital to ensure his health and safety was crystal clear. Yet, the Punjab Government's handling of the issue has been lacklustre, prompting the Court to issue a sharp rebuke in its hearing dated January 2. The State seems to have misinterpreted, or perhaps deliberately distorted, the Court's intentions, which has ostensibly led to further mistrust among the protesting farmers.