Arvind Kejriwal has been basically a demagogue who is fooling the people resorting to falsehood. He gets angry when ever people describe him and his AAP as the B-team of BJP. But yesterday’s incident left no space for any kind of review. Kejriwal has so far not officially severed his relations with INDIA bloc. It is indeed it is a matter of serious shame that he has preferred to go against the political tenets of the INDIA bloc.

Evicting the agitating farmers makes it explicit that he has no leftist or socialistic pretensions. While socialists and leftists stand for collective good; the AAP is for individual good. Kejriwal used the AAP to fulfil his political ambition and aspirations. For him it is the “power-ism” that matters. The duplicity of AAP could well be comprehended from the fact that he lent logistical support to protesting farmers in Delhi but used the police Punjab to break their agitation. It is indeed shameful that AAP, once a political sympathiser of Punjab's farmers, is now aggressor.

One thing is absolutely clear that this week’s crackdown on farmers did not happen without the consent of Kejriwal. Punjab chief minister Bhagwant Mann lacks that nature of moral conviction to act on his own. Only in 2022 Kejriwal had publicly said; “We will present the State’s farming sector as a model before the country”. The poor farmers at that time did not have the least inkling of this nature of treatment from Kejriwal. The farmers have responded to his gesture by bringing AAP to power. They even rallied behind Congress which had extended its support to their agitation.

AAP had come to power riding on the support of farmers. AAP had promised for swift implementation of Minimum Support Price (MSP) on crops and making Punjab the leading State in farming and farmers ‘income. But on March 19, AAP’s police cracked down on them detained farmer veteran leader Jagjit Singh Dallewal and Kisan Mazdoor Morcha (KMM) head Sarvan Singh Pandher, along with several other prominent agitators. They were returning after attending a meeting with a Central Government delegation in Chandigarh. With agitators agreeing to the proposals of Union agriculture minister Shivraj Singh Chauhan, hopes had brightened that the agitation going for last 399 days would final end on a positive note. During the meeting, Chauhan constituted a committee to study the financial implication of legalising MSP before the next date, May 4.

But as soon as 28 members of the farmers’ delegation, including Sarwan Singh Pandher and the ailing Jagjit Singh Dallewal, left the meeting venue, police took them into custody. Suspicions are being expressed that the arrests were made after deliberation with the Modi government. This eviction took place despite earlier assurances from Punjab Govt that the protest sites would not be disturbed. But, by the evening of March 19, both protest sites had been cleared. Over 1000 protesters were detained.

What a fallacy that the person who till recently was perceived as a progressive leader, is after March 19 incident is being called as the RSS agent. A parallel is being traced between the functioning of Modi and him. Like Modi he is friend of capitalists and industrialists. Even his own partymen cite the nomination of industrialist-turned-politician Sanjeev Arora to the Rajya Sabha. Kejriwal has been receiving feedback from the industrial community that AAP is losing trader votes due to the prolonged farmer blockade.

In a statement, the Samyukt Kisan Morcha said “The AAP government in Punjab has shown that it is committed to enforcing corporate and MNC frameworks in agriculture, and it is for this that it is collaborating and cooperating with the RSS and the BJP at the Centre. It is rather sinister that this move has come after top leaders met industrialists on Tuesday”.

The Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge was right in saying “it appears that two anti-farmer parties have now joined hands against the country's food providers. Both AAP and BJP were "intoxicated" with the arrogance of power and are guilty for their actions against farmers while insisting that the 62 crore farmers of the country will "never forgive these anti-farmer parties. First the Punjab government called the farmers for talks and then forcibly removed them from the protest site. The forcible detention of senior farmer leaders Jagjit Singh Dallewal and Shri Sarwan Singh Pandher by the Punjab Police cannot be condemned enough".

Amazing after so many months of agitation, the AAP has come to realise ‘only the union government can solve the issues of farmers and blocking roads in Punjab will only harm the farmers. Small traders have a lot of issues and the Punjab government is their own government, whatever problems are there related to Punjab, the government is ready to sit with them 24 hours”. The AAP leaders have turned conscious of the traders who are the traditional support base of BJP in the state, but is not bothered of the plight of the farmers who brought them to power in2022. Social activists describe this act of AAP government as the brutal example of “backstabbing”.

Farmers have been demanding a legal guarantee for the Minimum Support Price (MSP) for their crops, debt relief and pensions for agricultural workers, and the withdrawal of police cases lodged against demonstrators and justice for those killed in a 2021 vehicular incident in Lakhimpur Kheri. They also seek reinstatement of the 2013 Land Acquisition Act and compensation for families who lost loved ones during the 2020–21 protests. The Union government is yet to withdraw the cases filed against some farmer leaders during the 2020 agitation. (IPA Service)