Hisar clash: Admn to drop charges against farmers
As the second wave of Covid-19 pandemic rages on, thousands of farmers assembled at four toll plazas on the outskirts of Hisar on Monday morning to protest criminal cases filed against 350 farmers who have been on protest against the Centre’s new farm laws since last November. However, later in the day, the district administration agreed to drop the charges after a standoff with farmers followed by talks with their leaders.
An 11-member farmer delegation lead by Rakesh Tikait held talks with police and district administration officials at the mini-secretariat to resolve the deadlock over the clash with police in the district on May 16 that left several wounded on both sides last week.
After the meeting, Tikait said the administration agreed to withdraw the cases against the farmers.
“It was decided to withdraw the cases within a month’s time. If the Hisar administration will try to betray us again, we will start a pucca morcha (a more concrete protest) here.”.
Earlier in the day, nearly 4,000 Rapid Action Force and Haryana armed police personnel from Bhiwani, Hisar, Sirsa, Jind, Fatehabad and Hisar were deployed and anti-riot vehicles were also brought in to stop the farmers in their tracks.
Hisar SDM Jagdeep Singh said the administration has agreed to withdraw the cases registered against the farmers within a month.
“We have also agreed to provide a job to the deceased farmer’s family member.”
The protest comes amid a statewide lockdown imposed to curb the spread of Covid-19, even as India recorded 194,514 new cases on Monday, taking its total tally to 26,615,810. Of these, Haryana accounted for 741,785 total cases and 7,607 deaths.