Ghaziabad, 26 November
Hundreds of farmers in tractors started arriving in Ghazipur on the Delhi-Uttar Pradesh border on Friday, marking one year of farmers’ protests against the central laws.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PtUgalARaU
Many of them carried vegetables, bags of flour and pulses, spices and cooking oil on their tractor-trolleys, saying they were ready for a long haul.
The Bharatiya Kisan Union (BKU), an influential farmers’ union from western Uttar Pradesh, has been leading the Ghazipur border since November last year.
The BKU is part of the Samyukta Kisan Morcha (SKM), a farmers’ group leading protests for the withdrawal of three controversial agriculture laws and a legal guarantee on the Minimum Support Price (MSP) of crops.
“It has been a year of unmatched struggle mixed with joy and sorrow. We are fighting and winning. We will fight and win. MSP law is the right of farmers,” tweeted BKU national spokesperson Rakesh Tikait in Hindi.
The organization’s office-bearers claimed that the police were strengthening barricading at the Delhi-Meerut elevated highway patch at the Ghazipur border and the UP gate below it, even as they said the crowd would increase at the protest site by Friday evening.
“We have SKM meeting on Saturday and the future of our course of action will be decided only after that.
BKU spokesperson Saurabh Upadhyay said, “We have planned a march towards Delhi on November 29, but the SKM will take a decision on Saturday.”
“A large number of supporters started reaching the border on Friday morning and by evening we are expecting more than 50,000 people to come to Ghazipur alone,” he said.
The BKU supporter, who reached Ghazipur in the morning from Muzaffarnagar on a tractor in a group, said that they had come to the protest with arrangements for food and accommodation.
“It’s been a year, farmers can continue to protest for their rights for many more years,” said the villager, wrapped in shawls and mufflers.
Modi had last week announced his government’s decision to withdraw the controversial laws. PTI