Muzaffarnagar (UP): As farmers’ protest continued in different parts of the country, Farmer leader and National Spokesperson of Bhartiya Kisan Union Rakesh Tikait spoke to ANI on February 21 in Muzaffarnagar, Uttar Pradesh. In his special interaction with ANI, he spoke about the ongoing farmers’ protests in various corners of the country and their demands.
Tag: Bhartiya Kisan Union
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Punjab farmers squat on rail tracks as part of SKM’s protest against Centre over MSP, Lakhimpur violence
By PTI
CHANDIGARH: Punjab farmers squatted on rail tracks at several places as part of the Samyukta Kisan Morcha’s nationwide stir against the Centre “reneging on its promises” made when the protest against now-repealed farm laws was withdrawn last year.
Bhartiya Kisan Union (Lakhowal) general secretary Harinder Singh Lakhowal said trains will be stopped from 11 am till 3 pm in Punjab.
The four-hour protest is likely to disrupt train movement in the state, causing inconvenience to passengers.
The protesters squatted on rail tracks at several places, including Jalandhar, Phillaur, Ferozepur and Bathinda.
The demands of the farmers include a legal guarantee for the minimum support price and justice in the Lakhimpur Kheri violence case, Lakhowal said.
Eight people, including four farmers, were killed in Lakhimpur Kheri in violence that erupted when farmers were protesting against Uttar Pradesh Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya’s visit to the area on October 3 last year.
Union Minister Ajay Mishra’s son Ashish Mishra is accused in the case.
Farmers are demanding the sacking of Union Minister of State for Home Ajay Mishra.
They are also demanding the withdrawal of cases registered against farmers during the anti-farm laws protest last year, compensation to the families of farmers who lost their lives during the stir and rollback of the Agnipath recruitment scheme for the defence forces.
About the panel on minimum support price formed by the Centre recently, Lakhowal said the government included in the committee officers and farmers who were in favour of the now-repealed farm laws.
Bhartiya Kisan Union (Kadian) president Harmeet Singh Kadian, participating in the protest at Phillaur railway station, said the farmers were holding the protest on the call given by the SKM.
Farmers said they were forced to squat on rail tracks as the Centre was “not listening to their demands”.
CHANDIGARH: Punjab farmers squatted on rail tracks at several places as part of the Samyukta Kisan Morcha’s nationwide stir against the Centre “reneging on its promises” made when the protest against now-repealed farm laws was withdrawn last year.
Bhartiya Kisan Union (Lakhowal) general secretary Harinder Singh Lakhowal said trains will be stopped from 11 am till 3 pm in Punjab.
The four-hour protest is likely to disrupt train movement in the state, causing inconvenience to passengers.
The protesters squatted on rail tracks at several places, including Jalandhar, Phillaur, Ferozepur and Bathinda.
The demands of the farmers include a legal guarantee for the minimum support price and justice in the Lakhimpur Kheri violence case, Lakhowal said.
Eight people, including four farmers, were killed in Lakhimpur Kheri in violence that erupted when farmers were protesting against Uttar Pradesh Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya’s visit to the area on October 3 last year.
Union Minister Ajay Mishra’s son Ashish Mishra is accused in the case.
Farmers are demanding the sacking of Union Minister of State for Home Ajay Mishra.
They are also demanding the withdrawal of cases registered against farmers during the anti-farm laws protest last year, compensation to the families of farmers who lost their lives during the stir and rollback of the Agnipath recruitment scheme for the defence forces.
About the panel on minimum support price formed by the Centre recently, Lakhowal said the government included in the committee officers and farmers who were in favour of the now-repealed farm laws.
Bhartiya Kisan Union (Kadian) president Harmeet Singh Kadian, participating in the protest at Phillaur railway station, said the farmers were holding the protest on the call given by the SKM.
Farmers said they were forced to squat on rail tracks as the Centre was “not listening to their demands”.
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Lakhimpur violence witness BKU leader Dilbag Singh attacked by bike-borne men
By PTI
LAKHIMPUR: BKU leader Dilbag Singh, a witness in the Lakhimpur Kheri violence case, was allegedly attacked by two unidentified men here, police said on Wednesday.
The attack took place Tuesday night when the Bhartiya Kisan Union (Tikait) district president was returning home from Aliganj- Muda road in Gola kotwali area in his SUV when the bike-borne miscreants opened fire on him.
Singh, however, sustained no injuries in the attack.
Singh is among the witnesses in Tikunia violence of October 3, 2021 in which eight people, including four farmers and a journalist, died.
Union minister Ajay Mishra’s son Ashish Mishra was arrested in connection with the incident.
Talking to PTI over phone, the BKU leader said the miscreants punctured a tyre of his SUV owing to which he had to stop the vehicle.
“The assailants attempted to open the gates and windows of the SUV. When failed, they fired two shots at the window pane of the driver side,” he said.
Singh said he was driving the SUV and was alone.
He said sensing the intentions of the attackers, he folded the driver seat and bent down towards the floor.
As the vehicle windows were covered with dark film, the attackers could not decide the BKU leader’s status in the SUV and fled away on their bikes.
Singh said he had sent his official gunman (provided to him by the district administration) on leave owing to his son’s sudden sickness on the day.
He lodged a complaint with Gola kotwali police soon after the attack.
He added that he had also informed BKU-Tikait spokesperson Rakesh Tikait about the incident.
Meanwhile, Additional Superintendent of Police (ASP) Arun Kumar Singh told PTI that on the complaint of Dilbag Singh, an FIR under appropriate sections of IPC had been lodged.
He said forensic teams had been sent to the spot to examine the vehicle and the crime scene and collect evidences.
He further said police were investigating the case and efforts were on to identify the attackers.
The ASP added that the BKU-Tikait district president sent his gunman on leave on his own without intimating the senior police authorities.
“If the matter of leave to his gunman had been intimated to us, we would have provided him another gunman as an alternative arrangement,” he said.
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Rakesh Tikait launches dharna over arrest of BKU members; calls it off after talks with officials
By PTI
MUZAFFARNAGAR: BKU leader Rakesh Tikait launched a dharna on Tuesday after the arrest of his group members, but called it off later following talks with the district authorities here on Tuesday.
Ten activists of the Bhartiya Kisan Union (BKU) were arrested after a clash at the district hospital here on Monday night.
Protesting at the Kotwali police station here since Tuesday morning, Tikait demanded their immediate release, alleging that they had been falsely implicated in the case.
Later in the day, he withdrew the dharna after Additional District Magistrate Narendra Bahadur Singh and Superintendent of Police (City) Arpit Vijayvargiya reached the spot and requested him to call it off.
Meanwhile, the police produced the 10 arrested people to court, following which Chief Judicial Magistrate Manoj Kumar Jatav sent them to 14 days of judicial custody.
According to medical officer of the district hospital, Dr Baburam, people belonging to two groups had arrived at the facility on Monday.
While one group was being medically examined, the BKU activists began demanding the examination of the other group, leading to a clash, Dr Baburam said.
Tikait, who is also the BKU’s national spokesperson, told reporters that the district authorities wanted to suppress his outfit by falsely implicating the activists.
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Uttar Pradesh elections: BKU leader Rakesh Tikait warns farmers on attempts to ‘polarise’ society
By PTI
ALIGARH: Bhartiya Kisan Union leader Rakesh Tikait has warned farmers from attempts to “polarise” society and divert their attention by vested interests who will rake up “Hindu-Muslim” issues.
Tikait who was speaking to media persons while attending a private function near Iglas on Sunday night also said that farmers are” fully conscious” of the critical importance of their choice in the forthcoming assembly elections and do not need any prompting. “In the next few weeks Hindu-Muslim and Jinnah will be regular topics in the political discourse and you should be wary of such distractions,” the BKU leader said.
Making a cryptic remark, he said “Hindu-Muslim and Jinnah are going to be official guests in UP till March 15.” When asked about farmers’ voting preferences Tikait said ,”When farmers are being forced to sell their produce at half of their cost price they need no one to prompt them as to how they should vote.”
Farmers are “fully conscious” of the critical importance of their choice in the forthcoming assembly, he added. Assembly polls in Uttar Pradesh will be held in seven phases between February 10 and March 7 and the results will be announced on March 10.
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MSP next? Farmers head to Lucknow for Monday’s Kisan Mahapanchayat; SKM to meet at November 27
By PTI
LUCKNOW/MUZAFFARNAGAR/LAKHIMPUR: Lucknow/Muzaffarnagar/Lakhimpur Kheri, Nov 21 (PTI) The Samyukta Kisan Morcha (SKM), an umbrella body of farmers unions, will hold a mahapanchayat in Lucknow on Monday to press for law guaranteeing MSP and the sacking of Union Minister Ajay Mishra, whose son is an accused in the Lakhimpur Kheri violence.
The gathering, scheduled to be held at Eco Garden in Uttar Pradesh capital, was planned months before Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday announced repealing the three contentious agri laws.
The SKM, at a meet in Delhi on Sunday, decided to stick to the date.
Despite the prime minister’s surprise announcement, farmer leaders have maintained the protesters won’t budge until the three contentious laws are formally repealed in Parliament.
They have also indicated the sir for a statutory guarantee of Minimum Support Price (MSP) and withdrawal of the Electricity Amendment Bill will continue.
In a tweet on Sunday, Bhartiya Kisan Union (BKU) national spokesperson Rakesh Tikait gave a call to farmers to gather in Lucknow for the ‘Kisan Mahapanchayat’ demanding statutory MSP guarantee.
In another tweet in Hindi, he claimed, “The farm reforms being talked about by the government is false and cosmetic. These will not end the plight of the farmers. The biggest reform for the farmers and agriculture will be to make a law guaranteeing minimum support price.”
Vice-president of the BKU’s Uttar Pradesh unit Harnam Singh Verma told PTI, “The prime minister has announced the repeal of the three farm laws, but he did not say when the MSP law will be made. Until a law is made guaranteeing MSP and Union Minister of State for Home Ajay Mishra is removed from his post, the agitation will continue.”
Four farmers were allegedly mowed down by an SUV in the Lakhimpur Kheri district, the native place of the Union minister on October 3.
In the ensuing violence, four people, including a journalist and two BJP workers, were also killed.
Over a dozen people, including the minister’s son Ashish Mishra, have been arrested so far in the case.
Verma said that apart from MSP and the Lakhimpur Kheri violence, many other issues will also be discussed at the farmers’ mahapanchayat on Monday.
With Assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh scheduled to be held early next year, the ‘Kisan mahapanchayat’ in the state capital has assumed much significance.
Farmers are electorally important, particularly in western Uttar Pradesh from where Rakesh Tikiat hails.
“The BJP had promised during the last Uttar Pradesh Assembly elections that once it forms government, sugarcane farmers will receive payment within 14 days. But it has not been done. In the last four-and-a-half years, sugarcane price has increased by a bare Rs 25,” Verma said.
Reports from various districts indicate that farmers will be attending the mahapanchayat in large numbers.
BKU’s district president of Baghpat Pratap Singh Gurjar and of Muzaffarnagar Yogesh Sharma said that farmers have already left for Lucknow in large numbers.
“Until all the demands of the protesting farmers are met, the agitation will continue. The prime minister made the announcement with an eye on the upcoming Assembly election in which the BJP is seeing the reins of power slipping away,” president of Rashtriya Kisan Manch Shekhar Dixit said.
Amandeep Singh Sandhi, the in-charge of BKU-Tikait’s Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand unit, said that he expects 10,000 to 15,000 farmers from Lakhimpur Kheri to participate in the mahapanchayat.
Apart from the villages of the farmers killed in the Lakhimpur Kheri violence, several others would attend the mahapanchayat, Bhartiya Kisan Union state secretary Om Prakash Verma told PTI.
Sukhvinder Singh, the father of Gurvinder Singh, one of the four farmers killed in the Lakhimpur Kheri incident, said he would attend the mahapanchayat.
Lucknow Police Commissioner of D K Thakur said that elaborate security arrangements have been made for the ‘Kisan Mahapanchayat’.
Meanwhile, the Samyukta Kisan Morcha (SKM) will hold another meeting on November 27 to decide future course of action while the planned march to Parliament by farmers on November 29 will go ahead as per schedule, farmer leader Balbir Singh Rajewal said on Sunday.
Addressing a press conference at Singhu border following a meeting, Rajewal said, “We discussed the repeal of farm laws.
After this, some decisions were taken.
SKM’s pre-decided programs will continue as it is.
Kisan panchayat will be held in Lucknow on November 22, gatherings at all borders on November 26 and march to Parliament on November 29”.
SKM, an umbrella body of the agitating unions, met earlier on Sunday to decide on the next course of action, including on the MSP issue and the proposed daily tractor march to Parliament during the upcoming Winter Session.
Farmer leaders have been maintaining that the protesters will stay put at border areas of Delhi until the Centre formally repeals these laws in Parliament after Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s surprise announcement on Friday and have indicated their stir for a statutory guarantee of MSP and withdrawal of the Electricity Amendment Bill will continue.
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Will stay put until farm laws repealed: BKU’s Rakesh Tikait
By PTI
GHAZIABAD: Bhartiya Kisan Union leader Rakesh Tikait on Thursday said the farmers’ protests will continue till the contentious farm laws are not repealed by the Centre.
Only the repealing of the contentious laws would ensure the end of the protests, the influential farmer leader asserted.
“The movement will continue across the country until the three black laws are not repealed and a legal guarantee on the minimum support price of crops fixed,” Tikait said in a Hindi tweet.
“Bill wapsi hi ghar wapsi hai (Withdrawal of the laws will ensure return of farmers to their homes),” he said in the same tweet.
The Bhartiya Kisan Union (BKU) national spokesperson said the movement is for safeguarding “jal, jungle and zameen” (water, forest and land).
The BKU is part of farmers collective the Samyukta Kisan Morcha (SKM), which is spearheading the campaign, particularly the demonstrations at Delhi’s three border points of Singhu, Tikri and Ghazipur since November 2020.
Farmers are demanding that the Farmers’ Produce Trade and Commerce (Promotion and Facilitation) Act, 2020; Farmers’ (Empowerment and Protection) Agreement on Price Assurance and Farm Services Act, 2020; and the Essential Commodities (Amendment) Act, 2020; be rolled back and a new law made to guarantee the minimum support price for crops.
The Centre, which has held 11 rounds of formal dialogue with farmers, has maintained that the new laws are pro-farmer, while the protesters claim they would be left at the mercy of corporations because of the laws.
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‘Repeal farm laws by November 26 or farmers will intensify protest’: Tikait’s ultimatum to Centre
November 26 would mark one year of the ongoing farmers' protests at Delhi's border points of Singhu, Tikri and Ghazipur.
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Lakhimpur Kheir violence: BKU chief asks BJP workers not to visit UP’s rural areas as farmers angry
By PTI
MUZAFFARNAGAR: Bhartiya Kisan Union (BKU) national president Naresh Tikait has asked BJP workers not to visit the rural areas of Uttar Pradesh, saying farmers are angry over the violence that broke out in Lakhimpur Kheri on Sunday.
Addressing a kisan panchayat at the BKU headquarters in Sisoli on Sunday night, he alleged that the BJP was trying to defame the farmers’ agitation by provoking violence.
He asked the BJP workers not to visit the rural areas to avoid any untoward incident.
The remarks came after eight people were killed on Sunday as violence erupted during a farmers’ protest, claiming the lives of both farmers and BJP workers ahead of a visit to Lakhimpur by UP Deputy Chief Minister Keshav Prasad Maurya.
Four of the dead were people in the cars, apparently a part of a convoy of BJP workers who had come to welcome the UP minister.
They were allegedly thrashed to death.
The four others were farmers, officials said.
Lakhimpur violence: FIR against MoS Ajay Mishra’s son, several other persons as Opposition hits out at BJP
Farmer leaders had claimed that the minister’s son Ashsish Mishra was in one of the cars which they alleged knocked down some protesters who were opposing the deputy CM’s visit.
However, Ajay Mishra said he and his son were not present at the spot as alleged by some farmer leaders and he has photo and video evidence to prove it.
Meanwhile, irate BKU workers staged a dharna against the Lakhimpur Kheri incident on Sunday night and blocked a road in Shamli district.
The protesters submitted a memorandum to the Shamli district magistrate demanding action against Ashsish Mishra.
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Samyukt Kisan Morcha to hold ‘kisan panchayats’ at all divisional headquarters in UP
By PTI
MUZAFFARNAGAR: The Samyukt Kisan Morcha will be holding ‘kisan panchayats’ in all divisional headquarters of Uttar Pradesh later this month to protest against various issues affecting farmers, including their main demand to repeal the three agricultural laws passed by the Centre.
The Bhartiya Kisan Union (BKU) media in-charge Dharmendar Malik said on Thursday that the first such panchayat will be organised at Tilhar in Shahjahanpur divisional headquarters on September 29.
He said BKU is finalising the dates of the other panchayats in UP and assured that the farmers’ body will organise meetings in all 18 divisions in the state.
Farmers are facing great hardship over rising electricity bills and pending sugarcane dues owed by the sugar mills in the state, Malik said.
The SKM, an umbrella body of the protesting farmers’ unions, has been spearheading an agitation since November last year when farmers thronged Delhi’s borders demanding repeal of the three laws and a new legislation to guarantee minimum support price (MSP) for their crops.
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