Western Uttar Pradesh saw a mixed response to the call of ‘Bharat bandh’ given by farmer groups and political parties on Tuesday. While most markets in urban areas functioned as usual, mandis in rural areas remained shut. Members of different factions of the Bharatiya Kisan Union (BKU) protested on the National and State Highways. The police put many local political leaders under house arrest and did not allow them to join the protests, citing Section 144 and the Epidemic Act.
Bhim Army chief Chandrashekhar Azad was placed under house arrest when he was trying to move to participate in Bharat bandh on Tuesday. In a tweet, Mr. Azad said that “today our annadatas (farmers) need us” but the Yogi government had put him under house arrest since morning.
In Saharanpur, Haji Fazlurehman, Lok Sabha MP of the Bahujan Samaj Party, was also placed under house arrest. “The BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party) government is throttling the voice of farmers with force,” said Mr. Fazlurehman, when the police did not allow him to participate in protests at Gagalehri and Nagal. “These laws will only favour the corporates and are against the interests of farmers.”
In Budaun, local Congress leaders were placed under house arrest. “We have been stopped from lending support to farmers who are protesting in large numbers in cold weather. It is our democratic right and the BJP government would suffer its consequences in Assembly elections,” said Omkar Singh, district president of the Budaun unit of the Congress.
Click here to read the live updates of Bharat Bandh
Rajendra Yadav, president, Bhartiya Kisan Sangathan, was detained along with farmers at the Sector 122 crossing of Noida. “We are being held for violating the Epidemic Act but the government could not wait for the pandemic to be over before bringing in just laws for farmers,” he said.
Despite heavy security presence, with most districts in the region divided into sectors, and zonal magistrates and zonal police officers appointed, the impact of the Bharat bandh was also seen in Agra, Aligarh, Muzaffarnagar, Bulandshahr, Meerut, Hapur, and Gautam Buddh Nagar, where farmers blocked State and National Highways. In Aligarh, hundreds of farmers blocked the road leading to the Yamuna Expressway with tractors and trolleys. In Meerut, members of BKU blocked the Meerut- Paudi highway. Farmer groups assembled at nine different points in Muzaffarnagar, demanding that the farm laws be repealed. In Greater Noida, farmers jammed the Eastern Peripheral Highway. Hundreds of farmers also blocked the NH9 in Ghaziabad at the Ghazipur border.
Apprehending the protests, people refrained from travelling as most toll plazas in the region wore a deserted look. The fact that in many cities of western U.P., Tuesday is the weekly off day for markets meant that the true impact of the bandh could not be gauged.
