SC declines plea on farmers' movement at Shambhu border, says it is already hearing matter
A plea filed on the matter demanded that the Central, Punjab, and Haryana governments open the highway, including the Shambhu border. The petition stated that blocking the highway in this way is against the people's fundamental rights and is also an offense under the National Highway Act.
In a significant development, the Supreme Court on Monday refused to hear the petition filed on farmers' movement on Shambhu border. During the hearing of the matter, the Supreme Court said that the court was already hearing the matter. A plea filed on the matter demanded to direct the Central, Punjab and Haryana governments to open the highway including the Shambhu border. The petition stated that blocking the highway in this way is against the fundamental rights of the people and is also an offense under the National Highway Act and BNS.
"In such a situation, legal action should be taken against those blocking the highway and the Supreme Court should issue instructions to the central, Punjab and Haryana governments to remove the protesting farmers from the highway," the plea stated.
However, the Supreme Court said that it is not willing to hear the new petition filed on this issue. Last week, police deployed tear gas at the Punjab-Haryana Shambhu border to disperse farmers who began their 'Dilli Chalo' march. Police and protesting farmers got into a verbal altercation and drone footage showed police blocking the farmers at the border.
According to Haryana Police, the group of farmers moving ahead did not match the list of 101 farmers they were given who were scheduled to participate in today's march.
"We will first identify them (farmers) and then we can allow them to go ahead. We have a list of the names of 101 farmers, and they are not those people - they are not letting us identify them - they are moving ahead as a mob," said a Haryana police official deployed at the site.
Police said that the farmers did not have permission to move towards Delhi.
Farmer leader Sarwan Singh Pandher said, "The 'Jattha' of our 101 farmers and labourers have reached. We have already issued the list, if they (the police) have decided that they will check the IDs first before allowing us to move, they should tell us we will cooperate with that. We have shown the discipline and will continue to be so... They are using more tear gas today, as the wind direction is towards us. We are ready for any kind of sacrifice... It's the PM who has the solution for our problems, either he does it or let us march to Delhi."
A protesting farmer at the Shambhu border claimed that the police had the wrong list. He said that they were requesting the police to allow them to move ahead, as they have identity cards.