New Delhi: In preparation for the chakka jam planned by the farmers on Saturday, the Delhi Police have deployed additional measures, including tightening security and intensifying vigil at the city’s border points.
The police will also be “monitoring” content on social media to keep a watch on those “spreading rumours against the force”, officials told news agency PTI.
Delhi police commissioner S.N. Shrivastava held a meeting with senior officers and reviewed the security arrangements on Friday.
Farmer unions on Monday had announced a countrywide ‘chakka jam’ on February 6, blocking national and state highways between 12 pm and 3 pm to protest the internet ban in areas near their agitation sites, harassment allegedly meted out to them by authorities and other issues.
Also Read: Farmers’ Protest: All You Need to Know About the Countrywide ‘Chakka Jam’ on February 6
Elaborating about the security arrangements for the proposed ‘chakka jam’, Delhi Police PRO Chinmoy Biswal on Friday said in view of the violence that took place on January 26 during the tractor rally, adequate security arrangements have been put in place by the Delhi Police at the borders so that “miscreants” are not able to enter the national capital.
The Samyukta Kisan Morcha (SKM), an umbrella body of the farmer unions protesting the three farm laws, on Friday said there would be no ‘chakka jam’ in Delhi on February 6 even as it asserted that peasants in other parts of the country will block national and state highways for three hours but in a peaceful way.
A senior police officer from the eastern district of Delhi Police said as a precautionary measure, iron nails have been repositioned behind the barricades at the Ghazipur border, another protest site.
Deputy commissioner of police (east) Deepak Yadav said, “According to the protesting farmers, they will not enter the national capital, but still as a precautionary measure, we have made adequate security arrangements to maintain law and order. Adequate police presence will be in place at all important points and junctions across the district.
“There will be additional deployment of pickets at all the border points. All vehicles will be checked thoroughly at the entry and exit points of pickets and borders. Additional buses have already been taken and extra barricades are being put up at the picket points across the city.”
Rakesh Tikait’s Bhartiya Kisan Union (BKU) on Friday pulled out of the chakka jam plan in Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand, saying it could cause inconvenience to sugarcane farmers in the two states. The Union also expressed fears that “unruly elements could infiltrate the stir again”.
“During this time of the year, sugarcane farmers, mostly in UP and Uttarakhand, move their produce to mills and a chakka jam would delay them by at least two days. Our decision was also guided by information that a few people might attempt to trigger violence,” Tikait said, according to the Times of India.