CHANDIGARH: For a traveller from Punjab, Kundli had so far been a non-descript town on way to the national capital, after a five-minute drive from the famous dhabas in Murthal. Many would have not even noticed the rural-urban (rurban) locality in Haryana’s Sonipat district, but all this has changed over the past week on the Kundli-Singhu border.
Thousands of farmers from Punjab, and some from Haryana, have been camping on a 7km stretch of the National Highway 44, which runs through the town’s periphery and connects Punjab, north Haryana and Chandigarh to Delhi, since November 27.
For the laidback town in Sonipat’s Rai tehsil, this has meant a carnival-like chaos of tractor-trolleys, tents, makeshift kitchens, medical camps, impromptu poetry recitations and music performances, and a main stage from where organisers deliver speeches and volunteers host film screenings. There is a separate tented area for prayers too.
The highway itself is the venue and reaching the centre requires one to drive five kilometres through a maze of vehicles parked haphazardly on either side of the road. The last bit is nearly inaccessible because of the rush.
While Haryana Police divert Dehi-bound traffic on to the Eastern Peripheral Expressway a little away from near Rai Sports University, any vehicle which crosses the police barricading is greeted by joyful young men handing out mineral water bottles and fruits. Community kitchens to cook langar are common once the tractor-trailers, nearly all turned into makeshift dorms, begin. “It is a town of its own,” says Gurdeep, an activist of Ambedkar Students’ Association from Chandigarh while giving a tour of the venue.
Around 5pm, while a group of farmers from Haryana smoke a hookah in front of INLD’s Kundli border office, members of Delhi-based NGO Shaheed Bhagat Singh Youth Brigade (SBYB) sit cross-legged on the road and sing a song dedicated to farmers from a loudspeaker. Shehnaz Hindustani, a poet and a member of SBYB, says he and the members of his group are not farmers and live in Delhi, but had come to the protest because they wanted to stand by farmers. “They have made so many sacrifices to feed the nation and this is the least we could do,” he says.
After the performance, Shehnaz and his team get up and thank a group of farm leaders for “standing up to the Centre and showing the way to other farmers”.
Medical camps set up by charitable organisations are nearly as common as community kitchens. Apart from Khalsa Aid, medical camps have been set up by United Sikhs, Ludhiana-based Gurmat Gian Missionary College, International Punjabi Foundation, a team from Derabassi sent by Sethi Dhaba in Zirakpur, and more. At some camps, medical teams are also checking the blood pressure of protesters. Gurmat Gian Missionary College principal Gurbanchan Singh says they are also providing blankets and bedding to the protesters.“We will be sending more supplies as many protesters are aged,” he adds. Even flags hoisted across the protest are of various hues — white, green, saffron, yellow, red, and the Tricolour too. Punjabi music, especially the recently released bass-heavy protest songs on farm laws, blare on music systems from tractors and SUVs all day. Gurjeet Singh, who had come to the protest from Sangrur and was driving a tractor playing one such song, says the songs are not provocative. “Our livelihoods are at stake. The Centre is the provocateur, not the songs,” he says.
The protest venue has been divided into two parts. The last sit-in, where a tent has been pitched for reciting Sikh prayers, comes after an area where CRPF and police personnel have been deployed. The group was going to Burari grounds, but decided to stop on the Haryana side only.
The main stage turns into a source of entertainment by evening. On Thursday, National Award-winning director Rajeev Kumar screened his movie SIRI. “I wanted to show the protesters, through the movie, that the problem is not just in the ruling party, but government policies. As long as we are signatories to the World Trade Agreement, laws will stay. They should understand it is the corporate world-friendly policies which they need to oppose. I am happy people understand this,” he says.
Muslims from Malerkotla pitch in
A group of Muslims from Malerkotla have also set up a community kitchen at the Singhu border protest site. Advocate Mubeen Farooqi, president of Muslim Federation of Punjab, said he had promised help to farmers and was now on ground zero because of that. “Malerkotla’s sweetend rice is famous and that is the dish for today evening,” he says.