
Farmers burn an effigy of the Centre during a protest in Ludhiana.
Ludhiana, October 3
In a response to a call given by ‘Sanyukt Kisan Morcha’ (SKM), hundreds of farmers held a protest at the DC office here today and burnt the effigy of Narendra Modi-led Central Government and the culprits of the Lakhimpur Kheri incident.
Bharti Kisan Union (Lakhowal) secretary Harinder Singh Lakhowal claimed that similar protests were held across the state at the district and sub-divisional headquarters. The BKU (Ekta-Ugrahan) and Kirti Kisan Union, both constituents of the SKM, also responded to the call.
Lakhowal condemned the Modi dispensation for its overt and covert support to perpetrators of violence in the Lakhimpur Kheri incident while taking exception to continuation of Ajay Mishra in the Union Cabinet. He alleged that under the patronage of his father (Ajay Mishra), the main accused Ashish Mishra, who was out on bail, was intimidating witnesses and trying to influence the investigation in the case involving the massacre of farmers.
Reiterating the unstinted support of the SKM to the victims of Lakhimpur Kheri, the BKU leaders served an ultimatum to the Centre to dismiss Ajay Mishra from the Council of Ministers and the UP Government to cancel the bail of the main accused and send him back to jail, failing which the farmers’ bodies would further intensify their agitation for providing justice to the victims of Lakhimpur Kheri incident.
The BKU (Ekta-Ugrahan) led a protest of farmers at the office of the SDM in Paayal while farmers, led by activists of the Kirti Kisan Union, held a demonstration and burnt the effigy of the Centre at the district headquarters here. The protesting farmers charged the BJP government in UP and the Central Government with rubbing salt into the wounds of the farmers by retaining Ajay Mishra in the Union Cabinet and going soft towards the main accused in the case.