Justice Markandey Katju: Indian farmers’ agitation will fail. Here’s why…

Justice Markandey Katju

By Justice Markandey Katju–

I have sympathy for the agitating farmers in India because they are not getting adequate remuneration for their agricultural produce. I am afraid, though, that their present agitation is doomed to failure.

Here are my reasons:

1. The call ‘Dilli kooch karo’ (“March onto Delhi”) is unrealistic. Between Delhi and Punjab (the state to which most of the agitating farmers belong) lies Haryana, a BJP-governed state. Leave alone reaching Delhi, they will not even be allowed to cross the Haryana border, as that is being barricaded by heavily armed paramilitary troops.

2. The current Indian government represents the big Indian and foreign corporates that are eyeing the agricultural sector, purely from a profit standpoint. This puts the farmers led by big- and middle-level farmers, in direct conflict with the corporates.

If the government gives into the MSP (Minimum Support Price) demands of farmers, it will only strengthen the latter. The corporates do not want this; they want to take over the agricultural sector, displacing the farmers.

Therefore, the Indian government, which represents the corporates, will never grant MSP to the farmers, but will keep befooling them as it wants their votes in the 2024 parliamentary elections. I do not think that the ongoing agitation will achieve much. At most, they may get minor concessions. In fact, if they press for more, they will face police retribution.

3. If the farmers try to cross the Haryana border, it is likely they will be stopped by water cannons and teargas, and if that does not work, by lathi-charge and bullets. To allow a huge mob of farmers to storm the border and proceed towards Delhi means surrendering authority, and no government will allow that.

As much as one may wish that this does not happen, a repeat of the Jallianwala Bagh massacre in Amritsar in 1919, or Bloody Sunday (as in St Petersburg in January 1905) or Vendemiarie (as in Paris in October 1795) may be in the offing, and the farmers may be dispersed by a
‘whiff of grapeshot’, as was done by Napoleon’s cannons.

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