India farmer protests: 'War-like fortification' to protect Delhi

[Beauty Sirikarn]

Iron nails, rods, barbed wire, boulders and makeshift walls are being used to barricade Delhi's borders against thousands of protesting farmers.

The beefed-up security - called "war-like" by some farmers - comes amid a tense standoff with the government over new agricultural laws.

The protest, now in its third month, presents the biggest challenge Prime Minister Narendra Modi has faced.

His government offered to suspend the laws but farmers want them repealed.

Things turned violent last week when protesters and police clashed after thousands of farmers entered Delhi as part of a massive tractor rally. Dozens of officers were injured and one protester died. Farmers' groups and union leaders condemned the violence but said they would not call off the protest.

Instead, they they plan to block highways leading into the national capital on Saturday. Meanwhile, the situation at the protest sites - Singhu, Ghazipur and Tikri - has steadily worsened.
Delhi and the neighbouring state of Uttar Pradesh have deployed officers and drones at the sites, and have begun blocking the area around the protests, effectively cutting the farmers off from roads into the city.

Delhi Police Commissioner SN Shrivastava defended the barricading. "I am surprised that when tractors were used, police were attacked, barricades were broken on January 26, no questions were raised," he told ANI news agency. pg

"What did we do now? We have just strengthened barricading so that it's not broken again".

At the Delhi-Haryana border, police officials have blocked roads with large concrete slabs and embedded huge iron nails across the breadth of the road leading up to the Tikri protest site.