BKU Leader Asks Govt to be Ready for Nationwide Rally of ‘Tractor Kranti’

On Saturday, Bharatiya Kisan Union (BKU) chief Rakesh Tikait told farmers protesting against the 3 major laws on the outskirts of Delhi as of November "are still not going nowhere" and will escalate their unrest with a "tractor kranti" in the days ahead, a mega rally that would not be limited to Delhi but organized countrywide.

"We won't leave the demonstration, nor the administration," Tikait said. "We grant the centre time to take back the agricultural laws until October and guarantee promised MSP. If the govt. do not fulfill our demands, we are preparing and strengthening our agitation elsewhere in the country from October 2," Tikait said.

On Saturday, the BKU did not impose a chakka jam at UP Gate so that it does not hinder sugarcane farmers, but for a few minutes, protesters at UP Gate on the Ghazipur border blared horns to mark the end of the transport blockade declared on Saturday by farmers unions. After 3pm, the official time for the "jam chakka" to stop, the blaze of horns started.

Some BKU men subsequently went to the ADM (city) office in Ghaziabad and delivered a memorandum detailing their demands. But while no effort was made by the UP Gate protestors to impose the 'chakka jam,' they maintained Delhi Police occupied at the border.

The section of the highway where Tikait and a few other farmers had planted trees and shrubs on Friday was recovered by the Delhi police, in front of a sheet of iron spikes mounted there by the cops as tyre killers. But the farmers claimed 'an adjoining plot of land to plant saplings again as Delhi Police cleared the dump of soil the farmers had bestowed there and padlocked the location again.

"They have additionally expanded police presence in the zone. However, we will continue to develop our harvests regardless of whether you sow nails in our way," Tikait said. Also added, "We won't talk under pressure. Talks this time will be stringent. Aside from cancelling farm laws, we will also focus on guaranteed MSP for farmers.

Focusing on the significance of the farmers’, he explained, "The coordination committee is our lone stage. The choice with respect to our harvests will be taken by the farmers, the choices on the dissent by the committee."