NEW DELHI (AP) – Tens of thousands of farmers who stormed the historic Red Fort on Republic Day in India were again camped outside the capital on Wednesday after the most volatile day of their two-month stalemate kills a protester and injures more than 300 police officers. had made .
The protests demanding the repeal of new agricultural laws have turned into a rebellion that is rattling Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government. On Tuesday, more than 10,000 tractors and thousands more people attempted to pull into the capital on foot or on horseback, pushing aside barricades and buses blocking their path and sometimes being met by police with tear gas and water cannons.
Their brief takeover of the 17th century fortress, which was the palace of the Mughal emperors, played live Indian news channels. The farmers, some with ceremonial swords, ropes and sticks, overwhelmed the police. In a deeply symbolic challenge to Modi’s Hindu nationalist government, the protesters who stormed the Red Fort hoisted a Sikh religious flag.
“The situation is normal now. The protesters have left the streets of the capital, ″ said police officer Anto Alphonse in New Delhi Wednesday morning.
The protesting peasant groups will meet later Wednesday to discuss future course of action. Another march is scheduled for February 1, when Modi’s government will present its annual budget in parliament.
Protest organizer Samyukt Kisan Morcha, of United Farmers’ Front, accused two outside groups of sabotage by infiltrating their otherwise peaceful movement.
“Even if it was a sabotage, we cannot escape our responsibility,” said Yogendra Yadav, a protest leader.
Yadav said the frustration had built up among the protesting farmers and “how do you control it when the government is not serious about what they have been demanding for two months.”
Several roads were closed again on Wednesday near police headquarters and Connaught Place after a protest by some retired police officers in Delhi who demanded the prosecution of protesting farmers who committed violence, the Press Trust of India news agency said.
Political analyst Arti Jerath said Tuesday’s violence will mobilize farmers’ organizations.
“The Supreme Court has always said that the farmers can continue the protest without disturbing life in New Delhi. Tuesday’s development has given the government a handle to go to the highest court and say that this is exactly what it feared would turn violent. “
Tuesday’s escalation overshadowed Republic Day celebrations, including the annual military parade already scaled back due to the coronavirus pandemic. Authorities closed some metro stations and mobile internet service was suspended in parts of the capital, a government tactic to thwart protests.
The farmers – many of them Sikhs from Punjab and Haryana states – tried to march into New Delhi in November, but were stopped by the police. Ever since, unfazed by the winter cold and frequent rains, they have squatted on the outskirts of the town and threatened to besiege it if peasant laws are not repealed.
Neeraja Choudhury, a political analyst, said the government did not foresee what was to come and did not adequately prepare for it. “When farmers across India are restless, you cannot dismiss the protests as a form of resistance inciting farmers.”
Anil Kumar, a police spokesman, said more than 300 police personnel were injured in clashes with farmers. Several of them jumped into a deep dry drain in the fort area to escape the outnumbered protesters in various places.
Police said a protester died after his tractor fell, but farmers said he was shot. Several bloody protesters could be seen on television.
Police said the protesting farmers broke away from the approved protest routes and resorted to “violence and vandalism”. Eight buses and 17 private vehicles were damaged, police said, who had filed four cases of vandalism against the protesters.
The government insists that the agricultural laws passed by parliament in September will benefit farmers and boost production through private investment. But the farmers fear that it will become an agricultural business and leave them behind. The government has offered to suspend the laws for 18 months, but the farmers want nothing less than a complete repeal.
Since Modi’s government came to power for a second term, she has been startled by several convulsions. The pandemic sent India’s already shaky economy into its very first recession, social struggles have intensified and his government has been questioning its response to the coronavirus pandemic.
In 2019, the year of the first major protests against his government, a diverse coalition of groups rallied against a controversial new citizenship law that they believe discriminated against Muslims.
“The government on national security has failed. I think this government seems to be quite blinkered at the kind of security challenges it creates for itself by alienating minority communities, Muslims and Sikhs, ”said Arti Jerath, a political analyst.
India is predominantly Hindu, with Muslims making up 14% and Sikhs making up nearly 2% of the nearly 1.4 billion people.