Punjab farmer leaders Pandher, Kohar released; Dallewal breaks fast

Chandigarh: Farmer leaders Sarwan Singh Pandher, Abhimanyu Kohar and Kaka Singh Kotra, detained in a recent police crackdown following a meeting with a central delegation, were released on Friday.

Kisan Mazdoor Morcha leader Pandher was released from Muktsar jail while Kohar, Kotra and some other farmer leaders were released from Patiala central jail, they said.

In a video message, Pandher condemned the Punjab Police’s action against protesting farmers from the Shambhu and Khanauri border points where they had camped for over a year over their demands, the most important of which was a legal guarantee on minimum support price (MSP) for crops.

In a police crackdown on March 19, several farmer leaders were detained when they were returning from a meeting with a central delegation led by Union Agriculture Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan in Chandigarh.

The meeting was set up to discuss the farmers’ demands, especially the MSP guarantee. As the departing farmers entered Mohali after the meeting, they were met with heavy barricading and some of their leaders were detained.

Police evicted farmers and dismantled temporary structures from the Shambhu and Khanauri border points and vehicular traffic resumed on the Shambhu-Ambala and Sangrur-Jind highways after that.

Speaking to reporters in Patiala after his release on Friday, Pandher said that given the Punjab Police’s action against the farmers, it is now clear that the state government was hand-in-glove with the Centre to “save AAP leaders in Delhi from the ED actions”.

Pandher said the Punjab government would say the farmers’ agitation was against the Centre but now its own police evicted the protesters and removed the barricades.

“Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann should tell who blocked the highways -- was it farmers or the Haryana authorities who had put up the barricades?” he asked.

“We only wanted to go to Delhi peacefully in support of our demands. We were never in favour of roads being blocked,” he said.

Pandher said the Punjab government should compensate the farmers for all the belongings they lost after the forced eviction from the protest sites at Khanauri and Shambhu.

He added that the Samyukta Kisan Morcha (Non-Political) and the Kisan Mazdoor Morcha (KMM) -- two organisations that spearheaded the year-long protests -- will decide the future course of the agitation.

Meanwhile, farmer leader Jagjit Singh Dallewal accepted water and broke his fast on Friday morning, the Punjab government told the Supreme Court.