Kisan morcha forms panel to bury hatchet with Gurnam Singh Charuni

Tribune News Service

Sonepat, August 9

The Samyukt Kisan Morcha (SKM), a joint forum of protesting farmer unions on the Delhi borders, has constituted a five-member committee comprising farmer leaders of five states to resolve the differences cropped up Gurnam Singh Charuni.

Charuni, a farmer leader, had threatened to boycott the meetings after he accused other leaders of the forum of ignoring him and his supporters on Saturday.

Sources said the issue arose after leaders of four farmer groups from Punjab, who were attending a general body meeting of the SKM, were asked to leave it by leaders of 32 groups from Punjab, claiming that they were not part of the Samyukt Kisan Morcha.

In protest, Charuni also left the meeting and released a video, which also went viral on social media, they said.

The kisan morcha constituted a committee of five members — Ranjeet Singh ‘Raju’ of Rajasthan, Balbir Singh Rajewal of Punjab, Inderjeet Singh of Haryana, Atamjeet Singh, Ghazipur border and Virender Dagar of Delhi – to start dialogues with Charuni.

A senior farmer leader said informal dialogues had also been started by a sub-committee of Haryana farmer groups with him and the five-member committee would start talks soon.

The Samyukt Kisan Morcha had suspended Gurnam Singh Charuni for seven days in July over his statements to launch the ‘Mission Punjab’.

The trigger

• Gurnam Singh Charuni had threatened to boycott the meetings after he accused other leaders of the forum of ignoring him and his supporters on Saturday.
• Differences arose after leaders of four farmer groups from Punjab were asked to leave an SKM meeting by leaders of 32 groups of Punjab, claiming that the former were not part of the SKM
• In protest, Charuni also left the meeting