Attempts being made to trigger violence at stir site: Farmers
It is a matter of probe who is benefitting by disrupting our movement. Everyone knows ours is a peaceful protest.
RAKESH TIKAIT, farmer union leader
NEW DELHI: Farmer leaders agitating at the city’s borders held a hurried press conference at the Singhu border on Friday night to allege that attempts were being made to trigger violence at the protest site and the planned tractor march between Saturday and Tuesday.
As “evidence” of their allegations, the leaders produced before the media a fully masked man who didn’t reveal his identity but “confessed” publicly that he and dozens of other men and women were working at the behest of some people to procure weapons to the protest site and kill at least four persons.
While the masked man was unclear about the people allegedly directing him, he did identify a station house officer of a police station in Haryana as paying him and the others to carry out this task.
The man “confessed” that he was also a part of a group who disrupted the recent rally of Haryana chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar in Karnal.
He said that while he was one among a group of 10 hired persons, that included two women, there were more groups working to disrupt the agitation.
The masked man, who wasn’t very forthcoming in his allegations, or clear in what he was saying, alleged that his handlers had promised him R10,000 to bring weapons to the protest site. “We were to work between January 23 to 26,” he alleged.
He said that the plan informed to his 10-member group was to fire in the air on January 26 and then shoot at least four persons dead.
He alleged that his handlers would sometimes meet him in hotels and at other times in dhabas.
“They (the handlers) told us that the protesters were bad people, fighting for the wrong cause and are our enemies,” the masked man said in response to questions from journalists and farmers gathered at the press conference.
The man said that he was caught by farmers when some people suspected him when he was amidst the farmers in police inform. He said that his team had arrived at the protest site on January 19.
Bhartiya Kisan Union ( BKU) leader Rakesh Tikait said, “It is a matter of probe who is benefitting by disrupting our movement. Everyone knows ours is a peaceful protest. He (the masked man) says he works for money. We need to know who is funding him”.