The Congress on Wednesday sharpened its attack on the central government for the violence and vandalism on the streets of Delhi during the tractor parade in the national capital a day earlier, accusing the government of conspiring to malign the farmers’ protest.
“It is clear that this is a concerted conspiracy, aided and abetted by the Modi government that took place to malign the entire farmers’ movement,” Congress national spokesperson Randeep Singh Surjewala said at a press conference on the vandalism during the tractor parade.
Thousands of farmers, demanding that the government scrap three new farm laws, drove tractors into the city, defying police orders to stick to the pre-approved routes in breach of the agreement between the police and the farm unions. There were sporadic clashes between the police and the protesters at several locations.
Police Commissioner SN Srivastava told reporters on Wednesday that 300 police personnel were injured in the clashes and vowed that he would spare no one found responsible for the violence. He also rejected suggestions that there was an intelligence failure, accusing leaders of the protesting farm unions of breach of trust.
Scores of farmers breached the Red Fort too and hoisted the Nishan Sahib, the flag of the Sikhs, at the first available flag post. Information and broadcasting minister Prakash Javadekar called it an insult to the tricolour and blamed the Congress and its leader Rahul Gandhi for instigating farmers.
{{/usCountry}}Scores of farmers breached the Red Fort too and hoisted the Nishan Sahib, the flag of the Sikhs, at the first available flag post. Information and broadcasting minister Prakash Javadekar called it an insult to the tricolour and blamed the Congress and its leader Rahul Gandhi for instigating farmers.
{{/usCountry}}Surjewala said what had happened was “unacceptable”.
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“A set of people with the pre-meditated motive of violence, who have nothing to do with the ‘Sanyukt Kisan Morcha’, they were permitted to enter the premises, the sanctum sanctorum of the Red Fort, the pride of India, climb on to its columns and put a flag there, this is a sacrilege.”
“Those who did it, Deep Sidhu and gang, have been seen in the past cohabiting with Prime Minister of India and Home Minister of India, Shri Narendra Modi and Shri Amit Shah, ample evidence of which is now available in the public domain. Instead of arresting them, then and there, they were permitted to go back,” he added.
Surjewala said that this was the second time in less than a year that the national capital had been pushed to the brink of unabated, unchecked, uncontrolled violence under the leadership of Shah.
“It is a huge, colossal security lapse and intelligence failure on the part of none less than the Home Minister of India, Shri Amit Shah,” he said.
He added that an FIR needed to be registered against Sidhu, but instead the city police was wrongly targeting farm unions.
“How can police remain a mute spectator as 500-700 people occupied the Red Fort,” Surjewala said. “Can such a Home Minister, who is the weakest Home Minister in the history of India in the last 73 years, be permitted to stay in office even for a single day? Shri Amit Shah must be sacked and if the Prime Minister does not sack him, it will be apparent that Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi is a part of this concerted conspiracy to malign the farmers’ movement,” he said.