Farmers stopped at Punjab-Haryana border, teargas shells fired

Tension prevailed at the Shambhu border, the entry point to Haryana from Punjab, on Sunday as the batch of 101 protesting farmers was stopped and not allowed to move ahead to the national capital as they didn't have the permission owing to prohibitory orders.

To disperse them, the police used teargas shells.

The police claimed they had a list with names of 101 farmers, provided by farm unions, but the names of the protesting farmers were not as per the list.

“We will first identify them and then we can allow them to go ahead. We have a list of the names of 101 farmers, and they are not those people. Also, they can’t move ahead in mass as the local (Ambala) administration has prohibited any procession on foot, vehicles or through any other mode," a Haryana Police official deployed at the site told the media.

Farmers, under the banners of the Samyukta Kisan Morcha (Non-Political) and the Kisan Mazdoor Morcha, began their "Delhi Chalo" march's second day after deferring it for a day on Saturday, but were stopped after a few metres at the barricades, guarded by a heavy welded wire mesh.

The farmers have been marching in support of their long-pending demands, including legal guarantee for minimum support price (MSP) for crops, loan waiver and reforms to improve conditions in the agricultural sector.

"The Haryana government has turned this border like the India-Pakistan border,” said a protester.

As a preventive measure to check any untoward incidents, the security at the interstate border located on the Ghaggar rivulet has been heightened.

As a goodwill gesture, police personnel tried to pacify the farmers, who were arguing that being Indians, they have the right to march to their national capital, like any citizen, without permission. The police offered them water and biscuits.

Protesting farmers, mainly from Punjab, on Friday deferred their march for a day as they claimed that six of them got injured in a clash with security forces.

They also said they were ready for talks with the Centre over their demands without confrontation with the government. But they decided to resume their protest as they didn’t get any offer of talks from the Central government.

At the Shambhu border, farmer leader Sarwan Singh Pandher told the media that they have not received any message from the Centre for talks to address their issues and said a group of 101 farmers will again begin their march to Delhi.

Central paramilitary forces have also been deployed on the Haryana side of the border along with the state police.

Haryana Police on Friday asked the first batch of 101 farmers that were heading to the national capital not to proceed further and cited a prohibitory order clamped under Section 163 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS).

The security forces had also used at least 50 teargas shells to disperse the protesting farmers when they attempted to cross the makeshift barricades, heavily guarded by paramilitary and police personnel, by climbing on them. It was set up temporarily on the border to prevent the protesting farmers from moving ahead.

Mobile Internet and the sending of bulk messages have been suspended in parts of Ambala district. District officials have already issued orders banning gatherings of five or more people, and government-run and private schools were shut for the day on the administration's order.

To prevent disruptions, the Haryana Police had tightened security at Ambala's border with Punjab with multilayered barricades at the Shambhu border on National Highway 44 and also deployed water cannons.

The farmers’ earlier attempts to march to Delhi on February 13 and 21 were thwarted by heavy security at the Punjab-Haryana border. Since then, farmers under the banners of the Samyukta Kisan Morcha (Non-Political) and the Kisan Mazdoor Morcha have been staging protests at the border.