At a time when the Election Commission of India (ECI) has imposed model code of conduct in India, farmers' protest seems to be getting intensified once again. The ruling BJP as well as the opposition are busy in their Lok Sabha Elections 2024 campaign. Amid this, farmers organisations have announced a Rail Roko Andolan for an indefinite time accusing the government of not fulfilling promises. The farmer bodies are demanding the release of three peasants who are lodged in Haryana jail. Not only this, the farmers are demanding the political parties of India to clarify their stance over WTO. Farmers have maintained that the Government of India should pull itself from WTO. Below is what farmer leader Sarwan Singh Pandher said in his video statement-
"Yesterday SKM non-political, KMM made big announcements. Among them we will question the BJP as well as the opposition parties. We will ask the opposition parties why they did not give a clear answer on pulling out India from the WTO. How will they punish the preparatory of Lakhimpur Kheri if they form a government? Some parties gave a positive response to some of our demands. But, they are not speaking on our every demand, especially on MNREGA and Rs 700 wage."
"In Haryana, there were multiple meetings. In Chandigarh, BJP Punjab Chief Sunil Jakhar had said that they are ready to hold talks with farmers. They are ready to answer anything. Therefore, we have accepted their challenge and by April 23 they should finish this. But, whenever we ask something they say that these are big matters and higher officials can answer this. Therefore, PM Modi, Union Home Minister Amit Shah, and JP Nadda should come by April 23 and we will ask them questions."
"We first announced Rail Roko Andolan on April 9 but the government asked for time. We shifted the time to April 10. Thereafter, they shifted the time to April 16. Therefore, it was decided that Rail Roko Andolan will start on April 17. They arrested three farmers in Haryana- Anish Katkar, Navdeep and Gurkeerat Singh. They are ready to release them. Haryana officials had agreed to release the farmers by April 16, but they did not. Therefore, yesterday we announced Rail Roko in Sambhu which is between Ambala and Rajpura. Rail Roko will start at 12:00 PM. I want to clarify to the people of India that we do not want to stop the train but it is the failure of the government. They did not release our farmers."