Why Farmers Are Angry Again

The heavy-duty tractors at Shambhu in Patiala near the Punjab-Haryana border had turned up the volume.

- Anilesh S. Mahajan

The songs blaring out predicted dire consequences for Delhi (the Centre) and eulogised the bravado of the Jat Sikh community, as the cavalcade rumbled on to lay siege to the national capital on February 13. The protesting farmers claimed they were carrying rations and diesel to last for months. Right about then, the skies started raining teargas shells, fired from drones by the security personnel manning the barricades.

All this was reminiscent of the 13-month siege the national capital had witnessed (Sept. 2020-Nov. 2021), just that the farmers hadn't reached the gates of Delhi yet. The siege had forced Prime Minister Narendra Modi's government to back down then and withdraw the big-ticket farm sector reforms. With the general election just months away, the threat of a long-drawn protest has again got the ruling BJP worried. The farmer unions have had two rounds of talks so far-brokered by Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader and Punjab chief minister Bhagwant Mann-with Union ministers Piyush Goyal and Arjun Munda, but they didn't get too far.

This time, though, the BJP-led Centre was better prepared to deal with the protesters, stopping them at the Shambhu and Khanauri borders and preventing the tractor trolleys from reaching the national capital. The Delhi Police has also sealed the borders connecting Uttar Pradesh and Haryana as a last line of defence. Meanwhile, in Chandigarh, the issue is in the high court, with petitioners seeking to stay "all obstructive action by the state" to stop the farmers from reaching Delhi.