Farmers from throughout India assembling on the Ramlila Maidan in New Delhi on March 14, 2024, for the Kisan Mahapanchayat.
| Photo Credit: SHASHI SHEKHAR KASHYAP
Thousands of farmers, who gathered in New Delhi on Thursday for a ‘Kisan Mahapanchayat’ underneath the Samyukt Kisan Morcha’s (SKM) banner, resolved to defeat the BJP within the upcoming Lok Sabha election.
Alleging that the insurance policies of the Centre had been “pro-corporate and anti-farmer”, the SKM gave a name for mass protests in opposition to the BJP, and to observe ‘save democracy day’ on March 23 in opposition to the BJP’s resolution to area Minister of State of Home Ajay Mishra Teni from the Kheri Lok Sabha seat but once more. The SKM alleges that Mr. Teni is the “mastermind” behind the killing of 4 farmers and a journalist at Lakhimpur Kheri in the course of the 2020-21 farmers’ protests.
A decision adopted on the mahapanchayat additionally determined to “expose and punish” the BJP for not implementing the Swaminathan Commission method on minimal support value. “The real homage to M.S. Swaminathan is not conferring the Bharat Ratna on him, but implementing the farmer-friendly recommendations in his report,” mentioned senior SKM chief Ashok Dhawale. He mentioned multiple lakh farmers dedicated suicide within the first eight years of the Narendra Modi regime and it confirmed the plight of farmers underneath the BJP regime.
The SKM additionally demanded motion in opposition to Union Home Minster Amit Shah and former Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar for the current killing of farmers in police motion on the Punjab-Haryana boundary. They additionally resolved to convert the continued struggles of farmers and staff right into a individuals’s motion to defend livelihood. “This anti-people regime in the last 10 years has been working as agents of the corporate forces, both foreign and domestic, to privatise and loot the national assets – including the vast sector of public sector enterprises covering airlines, railways, seaports, insurance, bank and power – as well as land, water, forests, among others,” mentioned the decision termed Sankalp Patra.
It urged mass organisations to unleash an enormous and powerful protest in opposition to the BJP throughout the nation underneath the banner of United People’s Movement. “The mahapanchayat appeals to the people to punish the BJP for atrocities unleashed on the democratic, secular and federal character of the Indian republic,” it mentioned.
‘Democracy under attack’
In a message to the mahapanchayat, 10 Central trade unions mentioned the employees are with the farmers after understanding that the “corporate-communal nexus” is posing nice hazard to the core values enshrined within the Constitution. “Secular democracy, the right to dissent, freedom of expression, right to diverse cultures, languages and religious beliefs are under attack,” the trade unions mentioned.
“We are together in our serious concern for the economy in deep crisis, rising unemployment, falling wages and continuous rise in the prices of essential commodities, making living difficult for the common people. The cost of education and health services is rising exorbitantly,” they added.