Protesters at Singhu border take onus of cleaning clogged drains

The drains have been clogged ever since farmers began cooking, cleaning and bathing at the protest site. But more than the water flowing from their use, it is the disposable plastic items and leftover food that has left the drains clogged.

A group of eight farmers from Punjab at the Singhu Border have taken it upon themselves to carry out the laborious task of cleaning a 10-kilometre stretch of badly clogged drain running adjacent to the farmers’ protest site. The task they have taken upon themselves requires a kind of hard labour even their farming experience never required them to put in, but they have carried on steadily and slowly since Wednesday morning.

Farmers sit during the ongoing protest against the newly passed farm bills at Singhu Border near Delhi on Friday. (ANI PHOTO)

While they have decided to clean the drain along the entire one side stretch of nearly 10 kilometers that the farmers have camped, their progress has been slow. “Since Wednesday morning, we have been able to clear about 400 metres of the drain. We’ll continue doing the job until either we are here, or till we clean up the entire stretch,” said Amanpreet Singh, a farmer from Dhadday village of Kapurthala district.

The drains have been clogged ever since farmers began cooking, cleaning and bathing at the protest site. But more than the water flowing from their use, it is the disposable plastic items and leftover food that has left the drains clogged. “Earlier, the drain would flow freely,” said Sonu, a contractual sanitation worker with the Sonepat municipality, who is among the few workers deployed here.

While the municipality workers do collect garbage from the protest site, the protesters said they haven’t been touching the drain. “That is a lot of hard work and needs an entirely different team to work,” said Sonu’s colleague, Naresh Kumar.

But the small group of farmers said they couldn’t wait any longer. “The stench had become unbearable. The leftover food and other garbage had begun to rot. There were worms growing in the garbage dumped in the drain right next to us. Because of that mosquitoes are rampant and there is a threat of dengue and malaria looming over us,” said Amarjeet Singh, one of the eight members and who belongs to Nathupura in Amritsar.

“Since this road is our home now, it was upon us to clean it,” said Amarjeet.

Their work involves first removing the disposable plates, glasses and plastic as well as rotting food from the drain. The wet mud and muck is then pushed to the sides and space is created to allow water to flow. “We are using long sticks to push out garbage from those parts of the drain that are covered and not easily accessible by us,” said Amanpreet Singh who wore plastic hand gloves but couldn’t save his clothes and feet from getting dirty.

The garbage they are collecting is either being burnt at one place or dumped on an empty plot, he said.

This is what many other farmers who had begun cleaning the road and spaces around the langars and tents about 10 days earlier were doing with the garbage, drawing murmurs of complaints from local residents.

“If they are dumping the garbage from the drain to an empty plot nearby, they are just cleaning their space and not helping us in any way,” said a local shopkeeper who didn’t want to give out his name.

The overflowing drain had also led to the road space getting narrower by the day and leaving the farmers with less and less space to walk around.