As farmers arrived at Jantar Mantar, numbers of farmers were detained at Ghazipur border which is located on the Delhi-Meerut expressway.
According to ANI news report, Delhi Police has detained some farmers protesting at Ghazipur on the Delhi-UP border.
The Delhi Police has also increased the security forces and barricaded the Singhu border which is located in North-West Delhi and Ghazipur border.
Traffic movement was slowed down at the Noida-Delhi Chilla border due to security concerns.
As per sources, farmer unions will convene a mahapanchayat to discuss the future course of action regarding their demands.
Some of their demands include a legal guarantee for MSP, sacking of MoS Ajay Teni in view of his son’s connection with the Lakhimpur Kheri violence and more.
Sources in the Police said that more than 5,000 farmers may come from Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, Telengana, Tamil Nadu and other states to take part in the protest demanding minimum support price (MSP) among other things.
SKM leader Baldev Singh Sirsa said,”Our demands are met only through agitation, why is that? If the government does not meet the demands, protest will be intensified. Today’s protest is only of the non-political groups.”
“(After) the farm laws that were repealed in November last year, we were told that a committee will be in place to implement the MSP, and that the committee will be acceptable to us. They said that the cases against farmers registered during the farmers’ protest will be withdrawn, which has not been done yet. We want justice for the Lakhimpur Kheri incident. The recommendations of the M S Swaminathan report on the MSP should be implemented,” Sirsa added.
Samyukt Kisan Morcha (SKM) – an umbrella body of farmers – had announced the beginning of its 75-hour sit-in in Lakhimpur Kheri of Uttar Pradesh from Thursday (August 18) to press for their pending demands.
SKM is an umbrella group comprising around 40 farm organisations, primarily demanding the proper implementation of minimum support price (MSP) for crops.
(With inputs from ANI)