At UP Gate, pedestrians hit hard by heavy barricading
GHAZIABAD: Thirty two-year-old Poonam Chaudhary on Wednesday was seen making swift passage through a small jungle area adjacent to the farmers’ protest site at UP Gate. Chaudhary said that she works at a hospital in Ghaziabad’s Vaishali and wanted to go back home before it turns dark.
Like her, many other pedestrians made their way through the small area after the Delhi Police put up large barricades and barbed wires in the past two days. The wires have also been extended through the jungle area while heavy fortifications have already come up on adjacent roads and the Delhi-meerut Expressway after the incidents of violence on the Republic Day in Delhi during the tractor march by the protesting farmers.
“I wish to go home as quickly as possible as this area is isolated, and I need to go to my house which is about 8km away. There is no means of transport here and we have been passing through this stretch for the past two months as the expressway remains blocked due to farmers’ protest. It is a fight between the government and the farmers, but people like us are the sufferers,” said Chaudhary, who also has to attend night shifts in the hospital.
Like her, many other pedestrians cross the barbed wires as local made a small passage through by pressing the wires with the help of bricks and stones.
“This is not all. We also have to further cross a trench which is freshly dug up to keep protesters away. This is about 10 feet and if anyone falls in, they will end up with broken bones. We don’t know when this will end,” said Shanta Devi, a colleague of Chaudhary, who is from nearby Ghazipur.
The farmers are camping at the UP Gate protest site since November 28 last year, and have occupied the Ghaziabad-delhi carriageway of the expressway since December 3.
After the violence on the Republic Day, the Delhi Police has heavily barricaded the entire UP Gate area with hardly any space left even for pedestrians.
The Delhi Police commissioner, SN Shrivastava, on Tuesday had said, “I am surprised when tractors were used on January 26 and police were attacked and barricading was broken, no one raised questions. What we did? We have just strengthened the barricades so that they should not be broken time and again.”
Jagtar Singh Bajwa, a farmer leader from Uttarakhand and member of UP Gate farmers’ committee, said that situation at the border is like an “undeclared emergency.” “There is heavy barricading at the border and even sharp iron nails have been fixed. It is suspected that it is a ploy to turn locals against us. The situation is sort of undeclared emergency. On our part, we have no plans to go to Delhi,” Bajwa said.
“We have our volunteers who regularly check and try to spot anti-social and unruly elements,” he added.
As a result of blockade of the expressway, majority of commuters are getting diverted to the Kaushambi border near Anand Vihar from where they can enter East Delhi. However, the woes of commuters as well as pedestrians are not likely to end soon.
The protesting farmers have already given a call for “Chakka jam” on February 6 for three hours. They said that it is a call for blockade of state and national highways to protest against the suspension of internet and heavy barricading at agitation sites, among others.