Farmers protest: Vehicles snarl at Delhi-Gurugram border amid traffic curbs

With the resumption of farmers’ ‘Delhi Chalo’ march on Wednesday, vehicular traffic has been severely affected in Delhi-NCR. Heavy traffic was witnessed at Delhi-Gurugram border with traffic restrictions and diversions in place to stop protestors from entering the national capital.
Delhi Police has imposed strict vigil at Tikri, Singhu and Ghazipur borders. As a result of heavy barricading and blockades at various points bordering Delhi-NCR, traffic movement has been disrupted. The police are also checking vehicles on various roads leading to the central part of Delhi.
Meanwhile, protestors from Punjab have brought bulldozers and earthmoving equipment to break the police barricades deployed at the interstate border with Haryana. Haryana Police have asked their Punjab counterparts to seize the bulldozers and the earthmoving equipment.
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Farmers have resumed their protest after the fourth round of talks with the Centre failed.
At the fourth round of meeting between the Union ministers and farmer leaders on February 18, the government proposed buying of pulses, maize and cotton crops at minimum support prices (MSP) for five years after entering into an agreement with farmers. However, the farmers rejected the proposal, saying it was not in the farmers’ interest and announced that they would resume their protest.
The farmers are demanding a legal guarantee of minimum support price (MSP) for crops, implementation of the Swaminathan Commission’s recommendations, pension for farmers and farm labourers, farm debt waiver, no hike in electricity tariff, withdrawal of police cases and “justice” for the victims of the 2021 Lakhimpur Kheri violence, reinstatement of the Land Acquisition Act, 2013, and compensation to the families of the farmers who died during a previous agitation in 2020-21.