Hours after talks fail, police raid residences of farmers' leaders in Punjab

Following unsuccessful negotiations between the Punjab government, led by chief minister Bhagwant Mann, and farm unions under the Samyukta Kisan Morcha (SKM), Punjab police conducted early morning raids on Tuesday, 4 March, targeting residences of several farmer leaders, including Joginder Singh Ugrahan, president of the Bharatiya Kisan Union (BKU) Ekta Ugrahan, The Indian Express reported.

Farmer leaders have condemned the raids, asserting that such measures aim to suppress their democratic right to protest. Despite these developments, the SKM has announced an emergency meeting to strategise the way forward, reaffirming its commitment to proceed with the planned demonstrations.

Some of the leaders have been detained ahead of a week-long protest by the farmers, starting in Chandigarh on 5 March.

Talks to discuss farmers’ demands broke down midway on Monday evening, with farmers' leaders claiming a “livid” chief minister Mann “walking out of the meeting in a huff without a provocation”.

After the meeting, the SKM leaders announced they would go ahead with their call for a sit-in protest in Chandigarh.

Joginder Singh Ughrahan, president of Bharatiya Kisan Union (Ekta-Ughrahan), said the discussions with the Chief Minster were going on smoothly. “After discussions on eight or nine of our 18 demands, Mann said he had an infection in his eye for which he needed to go,” he told the media. “The CM then asked us about our plans for the March 5 protest, to which we replied that the discussions were pending and we will take call on our plan to protest after that,” said Ughrahan, adding the CM got upset and left the meeting asking “us to resort to protest”.

Later, Mann said his doors “are always open for talks with the farmers but inconvenience and harassment to the public in the name of agitation should be avoided”.

In the meeting, the CM told the farmers that the “government is always ready to resolve the issues pertaining to various sections of society through negotiations so that trouble to the common man through railway or road blockades can be avoided”.

He said that such action causes problems for the people, due to which they turn against the protesters, thereby creating discord in society.

CM Mann said, unfortunately, the common man has to suffer a lot due to such protests, which are unwarranted and undesirable.

The chief minister added that though protest is the democratic right of the farmers, they should also think of the huge loss to the state.

He said the traders and industrialists have been ruing that due to frequent road and railway blockades, their businesses have been affected.

Mann made an appeal to the farmers to avoid tactics that create discord among society. However, farmer leader Balbir Singh Rajewal accused the chief minister of trying to threaten them at the meeting.

Besides the implementation of the agriculture policy, the demands of the BKU (Ugrahan) include the release of land to landless labourers and the debt waiver for farmers and labourers.

With IANS inputs