Ahead of meeting of non-political farmer unions in Delhi on Tuesday, the Punjab farmer unions which are part of Samyukt Kisan Morcha (SKM) have formed a five-member committee to initiate talks with them. As already announced, SKM members BKU (Sidhupur) president Jagjit Singh Dallewal, Shiv Kumar Kakka of the Rashtriya Kisan Mahasangh and several like-minded farmer unions have called a meeting of non-political farmer unions on July 12 in Delhi. Dallewal and Kakka had objected to taking back 16 farmer unions of Punjab into SKM fold which had either contested Vidhan Sabha polls or had supported the political parties of farmers – Sanyukt Samaj Morcha (SSM) and Sanyukt Sangharsh Party (SSP). On Monday, 22 farmer unions of Punjab – including those 16 unions which were taken back into SKM fold on July 3 – held a meeting in Ludhiana under the banner of SKM, Punjab. “A five-member committee – consisting of Satnam Singh Behru, Manjit Singh Rai, Baldev Singh Nihalgarh, Hardev Singh Sandhu and Avtar Singh Mehlon – has been formed to initiate talks with all those unions which are expected to take part in the July 12 meeting,” said BKU (Lakhowal) general secretary Harinder Singh Lakhowal under whose chairmanship Monday's meeting was conducted. “Our primary goal is to strengthen SKM, raise farm issues on a common platform and resolve differences, if any,” he added. Meanwhile, Dallewal has indicated that several apolitical unions from Punjab, Haryana, Rajasthan, UP, Uttarakhand and others are expected to take part in Tuesday's meeting. Dallewal had stated that how can farmer unions which had contested polls in February or supported SSM and SSP, be back by saying that now they don't have any ties with SSM and SSP. Also, how can farmer union leaders who had initiated backdoor channel talks with the Centre during the farm agitation without informing the SKM leadership, be back. On July 14, district-level joint meetings of SKM, Punjab, will be called to discuss future protest programmes, said farmer union leader Avtar Singh Mehma. The upcoming programmes include rail roko on July 31 from 11 am to 3 pm across the state on a nationwide call by SKM against pending demands of farmers; conventions at district level from August 7 to August 14 against Agneepath scheme; dharna at Lakhimpur Kheri from July 18 to July 20 for which an appeal will be made to farmers to go to Lakhimpur in large numbers.
