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Tension prevailed as the Haryana Police fired tear-gas shells to disperse farmers from Punjab at Shambhu and Khanauri border points when they tried to move towards the barricades stalling their protest march to Delhi on Wednesday.
A meeting between farmer leaders and the Punjab government took place in the afternoon after which farmer leader Jagjit Singh Dallewal said that the decision to hold more meetings with Union ministers would be taken only after assessing the situation at Khanauri border, where a farmer was critically injured in police action. “If the farmer dies due to police action at Khanauri, we will not hold any meeting with Union ministers,” Dallewal said after the hour-long meeting.
Meanwhile, the Bhagwant Mann-led Aam Aadmi Party government in Punjab has, in a letter to the Union ministry of home affairs, denied the claim that it is allowing farmers to assemble at Shambhu and Khanauri. It told the Centre that the farmers were proceeding to Delhi to protest and are stuck at the Punjab-Haryana border due to restriction on movement.
It said tear-gas shells and rubber bullets fired by the Haryana Police have injured more than 160 people and added that 2,000 Punjab Police personnel have been deployed to maintain law and order at Shambhu and Khanauri.
The police have appealed for peace and asked protesters not to use force, while urging their Haryana counterparts to exercise restraint.
The farmers, demanding a legal guarantee on minimum support price (MSP) for their crops, had announced that they would resume their protest at 11am on Wednesday, after their fourth round of talks with the government failed to resolve the issue.
As some of them tried to begin to move towards the multi-layered barricades at Shambhu, near Ambala in Haryana, police dispersed them with tear gas. After a lull, there was a similar incident again.
A drone was also spotted over the protest site in Shambhu. A similar situation was witnessed in Khanauri on the Punjab-Haryana border when Haryana Police lobbed multiple rounds of tear gas to disperse farmers as they moved towards the barricades.
Following the tear-gas shelling, a chaotic situation was witnessed with farmers running for cover as the smoke enveloped the area near the Khanauri border.
Many protesting farmers were seen wearing masks and protective glasses to protect themselves from the gas.
Farmer leaders have asked farmers to maintain calm and peace at the border points.
Protesting farmers had rejected the BJP-led Centre’s proposal for procuring pulses, maize and cotton at the MSP by government agencies for five years.
Thousands of farmers, who began the march to Delhi on February 13, were stopped at the Haryana border itself, where they clashed with security personnel. The farmers have been camping at the Shambhu and Khanauri points on Punjab’s border with Haryana since then.
The Samyukta Kisan Morcha (Non-Political) and the Kisan Mazdoor Morcha are spearheading the ‘Delhi Chalo’ march to press the government to accept their demands, including a legal guarantee of MSP for crops and a farm loan waiver.
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