Year-long Farmer Protest Ends After Govt Agrees To Meet Demands

After intense negotiations with the Centre and backtracking of contentious farm laws, the year-long farmer protest has been called off. This came after the government agreed on all the demands put forward by the farmers, including the dropping of cases in all agitation-related cases. The farmers had also demanded compensation for the kin of the farmers who died over the last one year of protest against the three farm laws.

The Centre's letter sent to protesting farmers said that the compensation to the kin of farmers who died in last one year of protest has already been initiated by the governments of Punjab, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh.

The agitation started last year in September after the Parliament passed the three farm laws. In November, the protesters from various states like Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan, started moving towards Delhi. Since then, they have been camped at several sites bordering Delhi, like Singhu and Tikri.

The farmers will start vacating the protest sites from Saturday.

Centre's letter to protesting farmers

Even though Prime Minister Narendra Modi had announced to withdraw the three laws on November 19, the agitation continued as the farmers demanded the bill to repeal the laws to be passed in the Parliament. The two houses of the Parliament, Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha, passed the Farm Laws Repeal Bill on on November 29.

The demands put forward by the farmers also included to not put any criminal liability on farmers in cases of stubble burning.

In the letter, the Centre said that a committee will be constituted with representatives from Centre, states, farmers' organisations and agricultural scientists. The committee, according to the letter, will decide on how to ensure the mechanism to pay minimum support price or MSP to the farmers across the country. The government will also bring an Electricity Amendment Bill in Parliament after holding talks on it with the Sanyukt Kisan Morcha, an umbrella organisation of over 40 farm unions.