2002 stir: Kandela villagers remember ‘saviour’ bull

Deepender Deswal

Tribune News Service

Kandela (Jind), December 7

As the farmers’ protest atthe Haryana-Delhi borders entered the 12th day, residents of Jind’s Kandela village, which has been the center of a similar stir in 2002 against the then INLD government, remembers the contribution of a bull on his 13th death anniversary on Monday.

The villagers gave the credit of the success to the bull that had stood like a wall between the police and protesting villagers for nearly one and a half months. The bull died on December 7, 2003. Later, a statue of the bull was set up at the entrance of the village and it is worshipped as a deity.

The villagers, who are lending support to the ongoing farmers’ protest in Delhi, said it’s tough to bargain with the government, which had all power behind it.

Ram Singh, an elderly villager who returned from the Tikri border after 10 days, said he had participated in the Kandela stir in 2002 as well. “We stayed put at the protest site for nearly one and a half months against the government led by the then CM Om Prakash Chautala. Even now, it’s not an easy task to deal with the Centre. Thus the farmers’ organisations are geared up for a prolonged struggle with the government,” he added.

Terming the khagar (bull) as the hero of the 2002 agitation, Ram recalled that it did not allow the mounted police to enter the village throughout the protest. “I remember that the villagers were sitting on a dharna in front of a government school while the heavily armed cops were deployed across the minor canal, about 200 m away from the village entrance. The police were so afraid of the bull that they couldn’t cross the minor canal even when they shot bullets towards us from a distance,” he added.

Pradeep, another villager, said the bull died a few months after the stir and villager Tek Ram donated his land for setting up a statue in his memory.

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