Celebrating Republic Day but not the way we wanted it to be...

What happened on Republic Day? This year, many of us celebrated our Republic Day not by standing at the national anthem at our homes or watching the glorious military parade at India Gate but by witnessing violence unfold on the streets of New Delhi. The farmer’s protest that has been ongoing for several months now on the borders of New Delhi took a violent turn when the Tractor march organized by the farmer unions led to severe clashes between protesters and the police.

The violations by the protestors The tractor march which had been allowed to take place on the 26th of January 2021 with several guidelines and conditions put forth by Delhi Police failed to meet these guidelines. These guidelines included a cap on the number of tractors at 5000, however, close to 2,00,000 tractors were mobilized. The tractor march also didn’t follow the route they had been allocated by the Police and instead moved towards ITO and the Red Fort.

How was the Red Fort seized? The transgression of these guidelines by a large number of farmers soon led to violence on the streets of Delhi. This was followed by the seizure of Red Fort for 3-4 hours by the farmers that were part of the tractor march and the hoisting of the religious flag of the Sikhs, the Nishan Sahib at the Red Fort before the police mobilized enough personnel to regain control of the Red Fort and remove the Nishan Sahib.

The clash with the police One protestor, 30-year-old Navreet Singh, died when a tractor overturned during the protests near Delhi police headquarters, Sanjay Bhatia, deputy commissioner of police said Wednesday. Police also said that 86 officers were injured and 22 police complaints were registered against protestors for violation of lawful directions, rioting, damage to public property, and assault on public servants with deadly weapons, in incidents that took place across the city. This indeed was a dark day for our country and a disrespect to the celebration of our constitution which is done every year on the 26th of January since 1950. The Political angle Following the events, there have been a lot of allegations lodged against the opposition and the farmer unions along with the government as well. The opposition has blamed the government for infiltrating the Farmer’s protest pinpointing the blame upon Deep Sidhu who has been pictured with Prime Minister Modi at his official residence and was also a part of the protests. They have called Deep Sidhu a BJP agent who was used to incite violence on Republic Day and manipulate the young farmers that joined the protests on Republic Day.

They claim that this was done to quell the Farmer’s protest and distract people from the alleged issues with the farm laws. The BJP spokespersons have repeatedly claimed though that even though Deep Sidhu was a former associate of Sunny Deol, the BJP Lok Sabha MP from Gurdaspur, Sunny Deol, and the BJP have distanced themselves from him since he joined the protests last year. Many farmer leaders have claimed that the groups who engaged in violence and stormed the Red Fort were not a part of the protests.

The Khalistani connection The role of Khalistani outfit Sikhs for Justice (SFJ), banned in 2019 under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act for anti-India activities, is also under the scanner. Inputs received by security agencies also suggested that Pakistan's ISI was trying to exploit the protest. The Delhi police spokesman Eish Singhal said that officers had "showed a lot of restraint till the end but agitators defied the conditions and started their march before the scheduled time, and chose the path of violence and sabotage.” The Police engaged in using tear gas at the Singhu border of Delhi and also used tear gas and batons on the Ghazipur border to push back 2000+ protesters.

What's the Conclusion? The protests have been based on the new agricultural reforms, first passed in September by the central government allowing farmers to sell their goods to anyone for any price -- giving them more freedom to do things such as sell directly to buyers and sell to other states. But farmers and the opposition argue that the new rules would leave them worse off by making it easier for corporations to exploit agricultural workers, and help big companies drive down prices. Only time and further investigations will now reveal that whether these groups that turned the protests violent were part of the Farmers unions only or infiltrators trying to exploit these protests for political gains.