Crowds thin at Singhu, Tikri

New Delhi, Feb 16: As the farmers’ stir against three new agriculture laws of the Centre inches towards the three-month mark, crowds at the major protest sites — Singhu, Tikri and Ghazipur borders — visibly appear to be thinning, but the leaders maintain that their movement is now stronger than ever.
Even as the “langars” and tents at Delhi’s borders appear vacant, the farmer leaders insist that the crowd is merely shifting from one spot to another to mobilise more people to join the movement.
“The crowd is not thinning at all. We are simply trying to decentralise the movement and mobilise people in villages and districts, and not just in Punjab and Haryana.
“If creating a wave in Punjab took a few months, creating a similar impact in the entire country will take a little more time, but our movement is not losing steam. In fact, from our perspective, it is only strengthening by the day,” Avtar Singh Mehma of the Krantikari Kisan Union (Punjab) said on Tuesday.
He said many farmers have been travelling back and forth between their homes and the borders of the national capital as they have to manage their farms as well, but the strength of the protesters at the borders has remained “more or less steady” and the numbers are only expected to increase after the “chakka jam” of February 18.
The organisation of “mahapanchayats” across Haryana, Maharashtra and Rajasthan to garner support for the stir has also resulted in the thinning of the crowd at the Singhu, Tikri and Ghazipur borders. (PTI)