Farmers’ groups, led by the Samyukta Kisan Morcha (Non-Political) and the Kisan Mazdoor Morcha, continued their march to Delhi on Wednesday, a day after protestors from Punjab were attacked with tear gas shells by the Haryana Police as they tried to cross the Punjab-Haryana border at Shambhu.

A look at the top developments from the farmers’ march:

  1. The Central government will hold a meeting with farmer leaders through video conferencing on Wednesday evening at Punjab Bhawan in Chandigarh, reported The Indian Express. Jagjit Singh Dallewal, president of the Bhartiya Kisan Union (Ekta Sidhupur), said that protestors at the Shambhu border were given a choice between pressing on with their demands or resuming talks with the government. “Our people told us that we should explore a solution through talks,” he said.
  2. The X accounts of journalists Sandeep Singh and Mandeep Punia, who were reporting on the farmers’ protest, were withheld in India on Wednesday afternoon. Additionally, the handle ‘Gaon Savera’, run by Punia, and his YouTube channel were also taken down.
  3. The Samyukta Kisan Morcha has called for a nationwide industrial strike and a grameen Bharat bandh on Wednesday, in which villages will remain closed for all agricultural activities and works under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme. The strike has been called in support of the 21 point demand charter of farmers, and against the excessive use of state force against farmers by police forces on Tuesday.
  4. “We strongly protest the repression unleashed on farmers today at Punjab border unleashing lathi charge, rubber bullet and tear gas shelling making many injured and want to clear that the Kisan Movement in India is united and single minded and will resist any such act of authoritarianism and excessive use of state power,” the organisation said in a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday.
  5. Haryana Director General of Police Shatrujeet Kapur said that two officials of the deputy superintendent of police rank and 24 police personnel were injured in stone pelting at the farmers' protest site on Tuesday. "Some farmers were also injured,” Kapur told ANI. “I appeal to all to follow the law and order.”
  6. The Haryana government on Tuesday extended the suspension of internet and bulk SMS services till February 16 in Ambala, Kurukshetra, Kaithal, Jind, Hisar, Fatehabad and Sirsa districts, all of which border Punjab.
  7. Patiala Deputy Commissioner Showkat Ahmed Parray on Wednesday said that the authorities in Haryana’s Ambala have restricted the movement of drones along the Punjab-Haryana border, reported PTI. Parray had asked his counterpart in Ambala district to stop the use of drones for firing tear gas at protesting farmers.
  8. The Opposition parties have criticised the heavy use of force against protestors at Shambhu border saying that the Bharatiya Janata Party government in the Centre is treating farmers like enemies. “Tax payers’s money spent on military grade drone technology should be used to stop Chinese from coming into Galwan,” Trinamool Congress leader Mahua Moitra said in a tweet on Wednesday. “Not for domestic policing to injure and stop our farmers from coming to Delhi.”

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