A protest march to Parliament by hundreds of farmers from Noida and Greater Noida in Uttar Pradesh was called off on Thursday evening after the police assured farmer union leaders that a panel would be formed to look into their demands.
“The Noida Police Commissioner assured us that a high-powered committee will look into our demands and arrive at a decision within eight days,” said Bharatiya Kisan Parishad (BKP) leader Sukhbir Yadav ‘Khalifa’.
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“The committee will decide how genuine our issues are… We will fight for our rights. If we are still ignored and led astray, we will march to Delhi. We are vacating the road for now. We have a meeting with the commissioner at 8 pm,” he added.
Farmer Sandeep Kumar, who participated in the protest, said that their “demands are simple”.
“The government has sought eight days. We will wait until then. If nothing happens, we will gather again in large numbers,” he said.
Commuters travelling between Delhi, Noida and Ghaziabad were rooted in their spots for hours on Thursday after the farmers started to march towards the Parliament, which brought the traffic to a standstill on either side of the national capital’s eastern border for the majority of the day.
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However, they were stopped at Delhi-Noida border points at the Mahamaya Flyover, Dalit Prerna Sthal, and Chilla border by columns of police personnel around 1 pm. Protesting farmers, however, stayed put at the border throughout and early into the evening.
The agitation was called off at 6 pm. The farmers in Noida were demanding hiked compensation and developed plots against the land that the Centre acquired from them over the past 40 years to develop the township. The protest was simmering on sporadically in Noida for nearly two months now but snowballed on Thursday.