Protesting Farmers Flying Kites to Counter Drones, BJP Calls Farmers’ March “Political”
Manas Dasgupta
NEW DELHI, Feb 14: As the farmers from Punjab and Haryana remained steadfast in their determination to march towards Delhi to press for their demands and adopted ingenious strategy of flying kites to counter police drones on Wednesday, the ruling BJP and its allied organisations got busy in branding the farmers’ agitation a “mere political move” ahead of the Lok Sabha elections.
The Samyukt Kisan Morcha (Non-Political) and the Kisan Mazdoor Morcha are spearheading the “Delhi Chalo” agitation to put pressure on the BJP-led Centre for their demands, including a law on a minimum support price for crops and loan waivers.
The Centre yet again on Wednesday virtually rejected the farmers’ demands pointing out that announcing a guaranteed minimum support price (MSP), the key demand of the farmers would not be possible off hand. Farmers have been invited for yet another round of dialogue with the government nominated members for breaking the impasse.
As the ‘Delhi Chalo‘ protest by farmers entered its second day, an unconventional strategy emerged on the ground as protesting farmers flew kites to counter drones employed by the government to drop tear gas canisters on them. The situation at the Shambhu border, near Ambala, turned tense as security personnel fired tear gas shells at the protesters.
The ingenious strategy involves utilising the long strings of kites to entangle the rotors of the drones, potentially causing them to crash. Despite the ongoing stalemate between the Centre and farmer leaders, the farmers continued to gather at the Shambhu border, preparing to break through multi-layered barricades. Young farmers mobilised their tractors, ready to dismantle the cemented blocks hindering their progress.
The confrontation intensified as Haryana security personnel deployed tear gas shells to disperse the protesters, prompting the farmers to take precautions. They equipped themselves with water bottles, wet clothes, and even protective gear to minimise the impact of tear gas.
Union Agriculture Minister Arjun Munda earlier today appealed to the farmers, stressing the importance of constructive dialogue and urging them to avoid actions that disrupt normal life for the common man.
Sarwan Singh Pandher, a prominent farmer leader, criticised the government’s approach, accusing it of prioritising corporate interests over the farmers’ demands. “We urge the government to stop all this and ensure a positive atmosphere. We were ready for talks yesterday and we are ready for it even today,” said Mr Pandher.
Another Union Minister Anurag Thakur also urged protesting farmers to hold talks with the government, stating that even the Indian Navy veterans were brought back from Qatar through the power of dialogue. Mr Thakur said talks were taking time because the farmers are making new demands, and they should not indulge in violence and arson.
Referring to the eight former Navy personnel who were released by the Qatar government, seven of whom reached India on Monday, Mr Thakur asserted, “When Indian Navy veterans can be saved from the death penalty and brought back safely from Qatar, if 27,000 Indians can be rescued during the Ukraine war under Operation Ganga, if crores of Indians can be brought back during Covid… all of this has been achieved through dialogue. My request to our farmer brothers is to come and continue our dialogue.”
Claiming that the Narendra Modi government has purchased more crops than the previous UPA government and the share of agriculture in the Budget has also gone up, Mr Thakur alleged that the Congress – whose leader Rahul Gandhi promised a legal guarantee on Minimum Support Price (MSP) on Tuesday if it was voted back to power – has never respected farmers. A law on MSP is one of the key demands of the protesting farmers.
On Tuesday, farmers from Punjab faced tear gas shells — some dropped by a drone — at two border points of Haryana-Punjab as protesters tried to break past barricades that were installed to stop them from heading to Delhi. Till late night, they remained at the point where they were stopped at Punjab-Haryana border by Haryana police. Traffic crawled at many places in the Delhi-National Capital Region due to the barricading at border and in several parts of Delhi.
Communist Party of India (Marxist) general secretary Sitaram Yechury condemned the government action against farmers at the Shambhu border near Haryana’s Ambala and expressed solidarity with the Grameen Bandh called on February 16. “The kind of atrocities that are being meted out to farmers, the barbaric suppression should be stopped immediately,” Yechury said.
“Their valid demand of MSP, for which they were given an assurance, needs to be fulfilled by the Modi government. If they (the government) try to go back on their word, they will not succeed,” he said.
The Bharatiya Kisan Union (Ekta Ugrahan) announced that farmers would squat on rail tracks at seven places in Punjab on Thursday in protest against the Haryana Police action against protesting farmers at the borders. The decision was taken in protest against the use of tear gas shells and water cannons against protesting farmers by the Haryana security personnel at the Shambhu and Khanauri borders, he said.
More than two years after the massive agitation by farmers resulted in heavy losses for them, traders and shopkeepers at Delhi’s Singhu border are again looking at tough times with the current round of protests threatening their businesses.
Though the march is currently contained at the Punjab-Haryana border, the fortifications of multiple layers of barricades and concrete blocks at Singhu, along with a huge deployment of police personnel, to stop them from entering the city have also restricted the cross-border movement of people.
With various restrictions in place, including for traffic, even locals are having a hard time commuting and shops are closing as early as 2 pm.
Congress national general secretary Sachin Pilot said farmers have once again started protesting due to the stubbornness of the Central government, which has been unable to solve their issues. He said the Congress party would provide a legal guarantee for minimum support price if its INDIA bloc came to power after the Lok Sabha elections. “The Centre had promised to implement MSP. Now that the tenure of the central government is about to end, it should fulfil its promises,” the Congress leader said.
The RSS-affiliated Bharatiya Kisan Sangh (BKS) said it did not support the farmers’ march as it was “political” and does not seem to be serving the farmers’ interest. In a statement, BKS general secretary Mohini Mohan Mishra said farmers should get the remunerative price for their produce based on the cost but “political manoeuvres” in the name of farmers with an eye on the elections should be stopped.
He said that when movements are organised in the name of farmers with “political intentions” during elections, violence, chaotic environment and loss of national property follow.
A senior BJP leader also said though farmers from Punjab, UP, and Haryana are again on the march towards the national capital, the ruling party was not worried about its political impact this time unlike in 2021.
The BJP leaders admitted that the protests made for “bad optics” and could damage it in Punjab but said they were optimistic about “counter-polarisation” in the state along with Haryana and west Uttar Pradesh. BJP functionaries argued that the party would gradually “expose the illogicality of the demand for a law to guarantee a Minimum Support Price (MSP) for all crops.”
“When Parliament session is over, the Lok Sabha is about to be dissolved, and elections are to be announced, there is no logic in making a demand for a law. It would have made sense had they protested after the new government was formed,” said a BJP leader. Another BJP insider said, “If some elements in the protest are wearing the mask of being farmers, they should remove it and state their real agenda.”
Back during the 2020-’21 protests, the BJP leadership was nervous about the farm protests as it was worried about its impact in Uttar Pradesh ahead of the Assembly elections. Top BJP leaders assumed the demonstrations could adversely affect its Jat support base in west UP. At the time, the BJP top brass told leaders from Haryana, Punjab, and UP that “disaffection among Jats” could affect at least 40 Lok Sabha seats in these states.
But this time the BJP is confident of minimising the impact of the protests due to several factors including the joining of the Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) in the NDA and Bharat Ratna conferred on the former prime minister Chaudhary Charan Singh, the Jat patriarch. The party does not see a big potential in the current agitation to have a similar impact,” a party leader from UP said. The party, however, is unsure about its performance in Punjab and Haryana, from where the agitation has started and want the Centre to solve the impasse at the earliest.
