Plans by Congress president Rahul Gandhi to visit Mandsaur in Madhya Pradesh on June 6 to mark the anniversary of the deaths of six farmers in police firing there last year, coinciding with a farmers agitation planned for 10 days, has put the state government on the defensive.
Fearing large-scale violence and unrest during the proposed 10-day farmers' protest, which involves a “village shutdown” or “farmers holiday” in memory of the police firing incident of June 6 last year, the MP government has gone on high alert. During the 10-day protest, farmers have decided to stop supply of milk, vegetables and daily-need farm produce.
Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan chaired a high-level meeting attended by commissioners and IGs of police of 10 divisions of the state recently. The police and administration of 51 districts in the state have been asked to prepare themselves in view of the agitation, given the precedence of violence last year.
In the meeting, Chouhan asked the officials to maintain calm and ensure that law and order is not disturbed. He asked police officials not to act in haste and resort to extreme steps like firing. The intelligence wing of Madhya Pradesh police has reportedly informed that police is keeping a strict vigil on the activities of farmers. It is also taking preventive steps to stop miscreants from taking advantage of the situation by creating unrest.
Chouhan specifically asked officials to monitor the situation on the Bhopal-Indore highway where several passenger buses were burnt last year during a similar agitation.
He asked officers to keep communication lines open to ensure that any untoward incident is not allowed to happen. Chouhan instructed the administration to ensure that shelters, water and lemon juice were made available in the mandis where farmers were coming to sell their produce.
The proposed visit by Gandhi to the epicentre of the farmers' protest moment—targeting the BJP governments at the Centre and the state—is being seen as an opportunity for the Congress to revive its fortunes in a state where it has been in opposition for the last 15 years. Shortly after last year's firing incident, Gandhi was detained by police when he attempted to visit Mandsaur.
The proposed agitation by farmers has seen unprecedented support on social media.
Several farmers organisations across the country, led by Aam Kisan Union of Madhya Pradesh, have started a hashtag 'gaanv bandh' in Hindi and #village_shutdown on Twitter.
The village shutdown movement was formally started on social media from Harda Kisan Mandi on April 20 by the newly formed Aam Kisan Union. This farmers organisation, within hours, got massive support from peasants not only in Madhya Pradesh but also in Maharashtra and Punjab. This has alarmed the government.
Earlier, farmers' organisations like Bhartiya Kisan Mazdor Sangh, Bhartiya Kisan Union and half-a-dozen other farmers bodies have declared that they will observe a holiday for farmers between June 2 to June 10. This non-cooperation protest will be conducted in the villages itself and farmers will not go out from their villages anywhere.
A farmers leader of Harda, Ram Inaniya, said, “Our agitation will be peaceful where we will make people and government realise about our problems by not taking our produce to cities.”
This agitation is unique as for the first time, farmers have chosen Twitter, Facebook and WhatsApp to reach out to their own community and society at large.