Not only have the powers that be made the Punjab-Haryana border un-crossable for protesting farmers trying to reach Delhi, they have also made it well-nigh impossible for ordinary citizens to visit the Shambhu toll plaza and express solidarity with their annadatas camped there.
Those approaching Shambhu border from Haryana will find approach roads blocked and guarded by the police. They will also likely find Google Maps not working as internet access has been restricted across huge swathes of the state.
After a nearly 50-km detour through rural Punjab, my taxi driver managed to get us to the tail end of the caravan of tractors, trolleys and tents stretching for 10 km from the Shambhu border.
A group of farmers sitting on a mattress beneath the shade of their tractor brought back to memory the very first group of protesting farmers I ever met, at Delhi’s Ghazipur border on a cold, smoggy December evening in 2020. They too had been sitting on a mattress by the side of the Meerut Express Highway. I still remember the very first question those Sikh farmers had asked me as I had approached them. “Have you had something to eat?” Certainly not the kind of question ‘terrorists’ ask.
I asked this current group of farmers to explain their protest in terms simple enough for a non-farmer to understand.
Farmers at Shambhu border. Photo: Rohit Kumar
Amrit Singh, who farms a three-acre plot of land outside Amritsar, obliged.
“The issue of minimum support price is not just the farmers’ issue, it is something that concerns everyone in India, because everyone needs to eat! MSP simply means a fair price below which we should not have to sell our produce. While there is MSP for wheat and rice, there is no MSP for tomatoes, onions and other fruit and vegetables. That’s why we end up selling our produce for two or three rupees a kilo, but you end up buying it for 80, 100, or even 150 rupees a kilo!”
He went on to explain, “The manufacturer who made the shirt I am wearing fixed a price he wanted to sell it at. But we farmers get to have no say in how much we will sell our crops for! We are simply asking for what the government has already been promised to us, and we are being called khalistanis by the media! Please take your camera, walk around, and see for yourself if there are any terrorists present! Do we look like terrorists to you?”
Amit Singh continued, “If there is a problem at home, don’t we take our problems to the head of the house? Similarly, shouldn’t we be able to go to the highest authorities in the land if we have a problem? But what happens when we do? We end up getting beaten, teargassed, and shot, and then we end up being called the enemy! More and more we are being made to feel like outsiders in our own country. To tell you the truth, our hearts are crying.”
An elderly farmer who had been overhearing the conversation interrupted. “Look at all these farmers here! None of them are rich. Some own two acres of land, some three. Many of them barely manage to grow enough to feed even their own families! And yet, these are the people who are being bombed and shot! Modi should be ashamed of himself! Instead of interviewing us, why don’t you interview Modi and ask him what he is doing?!”
The anger in his voice rising, the elderly man pointed to the other elderly farmers sitting there. “My knees are damaged, this farmer’s legs hurt, this other farmer here can barely walk! None of us are sitting here because we are happy to, you know?”
I crossed hundreds of tractors and trolleys as I walked towards the bridge across Ghaggar river which has now become the de facto border between the paramilitary and the farmers. Every 50 feet or so, someone had set up a langar and was serving tea, food or water. An elderly gentleman in the back of a tempo offered water bottles and kinoos to everyone who passed by.
Farmers at Shambhu border. Photo: Rohit Kumar
About 100 meters from the paramilitary barricade, a group of farmers stood guard next to a thick rope that had cordoned off a hundred-meter stretch of empty road now considered “no man’s land”. The farmers have been instructed not to go beyond that rope. Strewn all over the road were gunny sacks which the farmers had thrown on exploding tear gas canisters to try and contain the smoke.
Barely 300 metres from the border, a group called the United Sikhs had set up a medical camp for those injured in the recent tear gas shelling. They showed me huge rubber bullets and exploded tear gas cannisters and told me that military grade weapons were used on the farmers. They also told me that a tear gas cannister fired from a drone exploded right next to their tent.
“Elderly people have inhaled tear gas, and it has damaged their lungs. We have removed pellets from the bodies of the injured. Please go to Rajpura hospital and see the condition of the injured for yourself. What has happened here is very, very wrong!’
A short distance away, Dr Harpreet Singh and Dr Ravinder Singh, two young doctors from Hoshiarpur were distributing medicines from the boot of their car. Mentioning their proximity to ‘ground zero’, I asked if they were afraid of getting injured in police and paramilitary action.
Dr Harpreet smiled, shook his head, and said, “When we came here, sar pe kafan bandh ke aye thhe. We came with the full awareness that we too could get injured or killed. But we are not afraid. We are here to fight for our rights. Our Guru Gobind Singh Ji Maharaj has taught us that just as it is a sin to commit wrongdoing, it is also a sin to tolerate it.”
I shook their hands and told them I admired their courage and selflessness.
Maninder Singh, a homemaker, told me she comes every morning to do seva and serve langar to the protestors, and then goes back home in the evening. She also made it a point to tell me, “Our Guru Nanak Dev ji has not made us cowards.”
Lakhvir Singh, a farmer from Sri Muktsar Sahib said, “Give us MSP for all 23 crops and we will diversify our crop cultivation and grow the crops that will neither deplete the water table nor compel us to burn parali (stubble) and pollute the air. We are not just fighting for ourselves, we are fighting for the rights of farmers all over India. Farmers in Bihar are selling their rice for Rs 1,300 a quintal whereas MSP for rice is Rs 2,200. We care about them too. Give us MSP based on Dr [M.S.] Swaminathan’s C2+50% formula and we will go home. We aren’t mad to want to sit here on the road…”
A farmer at Shambhu border. Photo: Rohit Kumar
The farmers did not conceal their pain at being attacked by “their own sons on the other side of the barricading”. While the quiet tenacity and courage of the farmers continues to be inspiring, it is deeply alarming is to see the massive deficit of trust that the government’s heavy-handedness and lack of empathy has created not just between the kisan and the sarkaar, but also between the kisan and the jawaan.
An elderly farmer who did not wish to be named perhaps expressed the tragedy of the situation best when he said, “We will forgive those who have hurt us, for they were acting under orders, and we will continue to feed you for that is what we do, but we will never, ever forget the vishvaasghaat (betrayal) that has been has done to us.”
Rohit Kumar is an educator, author, and independent journalist, and can be reached at letsempathize@gmail.com.
