Bhopal: The Madhya Pradesh police on Sunday (July 28) detained nearly 100 Tamil Nadu farmers in Madhya Pradesh’s Narmadapuram district who were aboard a train headed to the national capital.
The police halted the train at Narmadapuram station and forcibly detained the farmers, including the National South Indian River Link Farmers Association Tamil Nadu President P. Ayyakannu, among others. The farmers were travelling to Delhi to agitate for their demands regarding the Cauvery water dispute.
This is not the first time that Madhya Pradesh police have detained aggrieved farmers. In February this year, farmers from Karnataka were detained at the Bhopal railway station while they were on their way to join protestors in Delhi.
Cauvery is one of the major rivers flowing through Tamil Nadu and Karnataka. The dispute between states, regarding the allocation of water, dates back to the 19th century. A meticulously planned monthly schedule regulates the water distribution between Karnataka and Tamil Nadu which share the Cauvery basin. Tamil Nadu chief minister M.K. Stalin in an all-party meeting on July 15 condemned the Karnataka government for not releasing one thousand million cubic feet or 11,000 cusecs of Cauvery water to the state.
In an attempt to mount pressure on the Union government, the farmers on July 28 boarded a train to Delhi to demand their share of water.
Train halted for over an hour
P. Ayyakannu boarded the Grand Trunk Express with his 100 companions on July 27. The next day, the train stopped at around 6 p.m. at Narmadapuram railway station, only 10 kms away from Itarsi.
“We are the Cauvery Delta farmers who boarded the train to agitate in Delhi for our demands regarding the release of Cauvery water. It was a peaceful journey until 400 police personnel turned the Narmadapuram railway station into a cantonment and forcibly detained us. They took us to a nearby wedding hall in three buses and kept us there overnight. I immediately gave a letter to the Superintendent of Police to provide a reason for our detention who promised a reply in a day. They took us to the railway station on the morning of July 29 sending us back to Tamil Nadu,” said Ayyakannu while speaking to The Wire on the phone.
Local media reported that the city magistrate did not know who the people were that had to be deboarded from the train. The Delhi police were tracking them from Chennai, acting on an intelligence input that farmers might stage a protest in the national capital. City magistrate Asmaram Chiraman said, “We only received a message to take some passengers off the train and transport them to Shrikunj Garden. I have no further information.”
‘The police had no right to prevent us from moving’: Ayyakannu
Ayyakannu said, “We did not commit any offence and we told the same to the SP. They stopped the train and kept all of us waiting, troubling the thousand other passengers [on the train], to detain my companions. [This is] a democratic country. We are neither extremists nor armed with weapons. The citizens of India have the liberty to move from Kashmir to Kanyakumari, as per the Indian Constitution. I had obtained an order from the Madras high court, that we were allowed to agitate and could be arrested if we make any mistake. The Delhi high court also permitted me to agitate anywhere in Delhi. The police had no right to prevent [us] from moving,” he said.
Ayyakannu alleged the officials had said that they “can’t disobey the Delhi office”.
“Whose orders and which office [have] they followed? Our only request is that Karnataka must release water every month. They can keep 60% and release 40% to us if there is a shortage of water but they must abide by the Supreme Court’s order. Union home minister promised to inter-link Godavari and Cauvery. However, he did not sanction funds for it. What do we do if not agitate?” Ayyakannu said.
In response to All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) MP M. Thambidurai’s question in the Rajya Sabha in July 2023, former Union minister Bishweswar Tudu had said that the Union government had made efforts to reach a consensus among states on water sharing. However, he emphasised that the states themselves must ultimately agree.
Detention is arbitrary and unconstitutional
Kisan Sangharsh Samiti National President Dr Suneelam said that the farmers were only traveLling to Delhi to serve a memorandum on the Cauvery water dispute. They had tickets and were still arbitrarily detained in a wedding hall. “In a conversation with police officers, they informed that Sections 172 of BNSS (Bhartiya Nagrik Suraksha Sanhita) consists of a provision that any individual can be detained if there is a law and order issue, without citing any reason. This is why farmers were detained and sent back via another train,” Suneelam said.
According to the Business Standard, “The BNSS, which replaced the British-era Code of Criminal Procedure, has introduced “a new insertion as Clause 172 in ‘Preventive Action of the Police'”.
It states that people must conform to directions of the police issued in the course of preventing the commission of a cognizable offence, officials said. The provision allows a police officer to detain such person and produce them before a magistrate or, in petty cases, release the person as soon as possible within 24 hours, they said.
“The entire process was unconstitutional. Though the officials did not provide any written order, they informed us that the orders of detention were from Delhi. It must be from the home ministry. The Union government has been doing this for years. The Madhya Pradesh Police has well experimented with the new criminal laws on farmers. It speaks to the volume of danger these laws have for civilians.”
“The farmers’ suicide rate is one of the highest in Madhya Pradesh but they take fake medals of highest production. Six farmers were killed in Mandsaur and they are yet to get justice. All police officers were protected by the Shivraj government. Are they not murderers?”
Six farmers were killed in police firing during an agitation in Mandsaur, for better price of production, in June 2017. As per the National Crime Record Bureau report from 2022, at least one farmer committed suicide every 12 hours in Madhya Pradesh in 2020. The suicide rate increased by 35% as 735 farmers committed suicide in that year. 154 farmers and daily-wage labourers die by suicide in India every day, the NCRB report said.