Police lathicharge villagers protesting against biogas plant

The police and villagers came to a face-off today at Akhara village near Jagraon town of Ludhiana over the protest going on for the past several months against the construction of the biogas plant at the village, citing health issues the plant may cause. To end the protest, the administration had deployed a large number of police personnel this morning. Around 4.30 am, the village was converted into a police cantonment.

More than 500 police personnel were deployed at the protest site. Senior police officers urged the protesting women and men to end the protest, but seeing the resistance, the police personnel resorted to a mild lathicharge, pushing the sloganeering people pushed into the fields.

The police administration also detained many farmer leaders before taking this action. The police personnel uprooted the sheds and tents of the protesters, due to which there was a lot of anger against the police among the people of the village.

Farmer Surjeet Singh said that, “The police have detained many of us. We don’t know where the detained people have been taken. The entire village has been turned into a police camp.”

“The people of the village are together and the factory will not be allowed to be built under any circumstances. Today the police have uprooted the tents erected by the villagers. The police have loaded goods worth about 10 lakhs of the people in trucks. The protest has been going on for the last one year. The entire village is sealed today and the police have also beaten villagers with batons. There is a lot of anger among the people against the Punjab Government,” said some protesting villagers.

Sources said villages had resumed the dharna outside the plant and vowed that they would not let this plant run at any cost. Meanwhile, Ludhiana Rural SSP Ankur Gupta didn’t answer despite being called repeatedly.

In similar protests In March, on the completion of one year of the permanent sit in against the bio-gas factory at Bhundri village, the Sangharsh Committee, Bhundri, had carried out a protest march in the village. In a similar action, the police had also removed the villagers of Bagge Kalan village from the protest site in a surprise early morning action a few months ago, but villagers are still continuing their protest against the bio-gas plant.