Kisan Andolan: Supreme Court Asks Central & State Governments to Ensure Protests Don’t Block Roads

Farmers in large numbers have been camping at borders of Delhi since November in protest against three controversial central laws and this is leading to road blockage and huge traffic jams.   

On Monday, the Supreme Court stated that it is the responsibility of the Centre and the states to ensure that agitations do not block daily movement on public roads. Nowadays, it is one of the main concerns of the Supreme Court as protest of farmers is on the grim view in Delhi’s borders, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh. 

A bench of justices Sanjay Kishan Kaul and Hrishikesh Roy has given an advice to call upon the two prominent leaders of unions, which have been leading the protests over three contradictory agricultural laws since November last year. It is suggested that the Centre and the states should work in the direction of avoiding road blockades. 

The Supreme Court said, “The solution lies in the hands of the Union of India and state governments. They should coordinate with each other to ensure that if the protests are on, the traffic should not be stopped in any manner so that to and for for people is not disturbed and does not cause any inconvenience to them”. 

The bench has been considering a complaint of a woman according to whom, it took her taking almost two hours, instead of 20 minutes to travel from Noida to Delhi because of continuous blockades and protests.  

Justice Kaul told the S-G, “What has been going on Mr Mehta? You have to find a solution. Courts cannot find a solution. There are some courts which have passed certain orders but it will work only if the governments find a solution”. 

Yogi government, in its affidavit, has said that efforts were underway to make the farmers understand the “grossly illegal act of blocking roads” but the difficulty is that most of the protesters are of old age. The affidavit stated that, “Diversions have been created to allow for smooth movement of traffic between Ghaziabad in Uttar Pradesh and Delhi via the Maharajpur and Hindon roads as NH 24 was still blocked”.