Indian farmers’ protests against the government in New Delhi on Jan. 25 resulted in property destruction, injuries to hundreds of people, particularly police officers, and one farmer’s death. You might draw parallels with mob attacks on the U.S. Capital and infer that farmers are destabilizing Indian democracy. To the contrary, they’re revitalizing it.
The farmers’ movement is a democratic response to democratic erosion. It has consistently promoted nonviolence in face of police repression and fostered tolerance among people of different ideologies and identities. Movement leaders condemned violence by some protesters that day and persuaded all the farmers to leave New Delhi and resume the peaceful sit-ins on its outskirts that they initiated two months earlier.
Farmers’ protests erupted in September in the state of Punjab after parliament hurriedly passed three agrarian laws which eliminate guaranteed prices for certain crops and increase their vulnerability to corporate exploitation. On Nov. 26 in a Dilli Chalo (Let’s Go to Delhi) campaign, tens of thousands of farmers traveled to Delhi by foot, bicycle and tractor to protest the laws. Police erected barricades and used water cannons and tear gas to prevent farmers from entering the neighboring state of Haryana. However, the farmers breached the barricades, blockaded roads, railway lines and highways with tractors, and created makeshift camps at six entry points By late November, 250,000 to 300,000 farmers had converged at border points on the way to Delhi.
The farmers’ movement fears that the laws will enable domestic and global corporations to determine what crops they grow and what prices they charge. But their grievances and demands go beyond farm policy. They claim that the government has capitulated to business elites like the billionaires Mukesh Ambani and Gautam Adani. They criticize the Bharatiya Janata Party government for decreeing major policy changes, some of which violate federal and constitutional principles, with little deliberation and consultation. They reproach the government for censoring the press and using draconian laws to incarcerate critics without trial on baseless charges of sedition, defamation and terrorism.
The farmers’ movement has not simply advocated democratic policies and procedures; it has also engaged in democratic practices. The Punjabi Sikhs who lead the movement oppose state persecution of religious minorities. They express solidarity with Muslims who are the target of recent discriminatory citizenship laws. Sikhs also contest the government’s attempt to discredit them as terrorists and Khalistani separatists (in reference to the 1980s Sikh separatist movement in Punjab). One of their posters wryly proclaims, “When we save Hindus, we are angels; when we die to save the nation, we are martyrs; when we fight for our rights, we are Khalistani.” The camps on the border sites embody Sikh religious principles of sewa (service) and langar, a community kitchen in Sikh temples which serves free meals to all visitors, regardless of religion, caste, class and gender.
The sit-ins challenge the regime’s hierarchical, secretive character by forging egalitarian, inclusive communities. The protest sites have libraries, gyms, salons, blood donation clinics and health centers. Volunteers distribute refreshments and meals throughout the day. By having people cook and eat together, the farmers repudiate the caste and gender hierarchies that traditional Hindu dietary practices create and sustain. By feeding police officers and the poor, they defy the discriminatory and opportunistic basis on which Hindu nationalists provide social services. To promote transparency and prevent dependence on any one leader, representatives from 31 farmers’ unions alternate participating in negotiations with government officials. To maintain the movement’s autonomy, they have not included even supportive party leaders in these negotiations.
Although the government claims to promote women’s empowerment, its policies have contributed to their landlessness and indebtedness. The agrarian crisis has increased women’s responsibilities for their families. Because suicide rates from indebtedness are higher among male than female farmers, widows — who own little or no land — must repay high-interest loans. As men have migrated to the cities, women have assumed increasing responsibilities for cultivation and entrepreneurship. They organized protests across the country to celebrate ‘Women Farmers Day’ on Jan. 18 and were outraged when the chief justice of the Supreme Court urged women and the elderly to return home, because they were being “kept” at the protest. They have helped sustain the ongoing farmers’ sit-ins.
Judged solely by their political effectiveness, sit-ins and occupation movements, like the farmers’ protest, have mixed results. However, they must also be evaluated relative to the political alternatives. Opportunities for expressing dissent are limited, institutional channels are blocked and national political parties lack power and imagination.
Moreover, regardless of their outcomes, prolonged-sits are often democratic acts. They educate the public about the dangers of government overreach and demonstrate the importance of active citizenship. They redefine who is a legitimate political actor and what is a legitimate form of political participation. Even when they fail to achieve their goals, they foster activism among other groups. The farmers’ movement followed nation-wide activism against discriminatory citizenship laws months earlier. Other movements will surely follow. At a time when democracy is under siege, such protests are testimony to its resilience.
