Farmers’ Uprising – A Broad Timeline

The build-up to the farmer’s agitation and call for Bharat Bandh on December 8, tell the story of their great betrayal by the Narendra Modi government, which has done nothing to lift the farmers out of agrarian crisis looming large for quite some time.  Farmers have been on the streets for quite some time – be it in Maharashtra, Rajasthan, Andhra Pradesh, Haryana, Madhya Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Punjab, Uttar Pradesh among several other states – with Left organisations, especially the All India Kisan Sabha (AIKS), spearheading struggles in several of these states.

While state-wise struggles have been ongoing, the turning point in the farmers’ movement came after the firing on protesting farmers in Mandsaur in Madhya Pradesh (six farmers were killed). This happened during country-wide protests against the Land Acquisition Ordinance which was brought in by the Modi government in 2015. The movement was spearheaded by a broad front of farmers’ organisations and other peoples' organisations under the rubric of Bhumi Adhikar Andolan. The ordinance was later withdrawn.

Faced with rising debt and the Modi government's refusal to implement its election promise of implementing the Swaminathan Commission recommendation for higher Minimum Support Prices, an umbrella organisation – the All India Kisan Sangharsh Coordination Committee (AIKSCC) with over 100 organisations was formed in June 2017, which has led a series of struggles since then. The AIKSCC now has over 300 organisations as members. Some of the prominent struggles and agitations since then are:

July 2017 – Tamil Nadu Farmers in Delhi

In July 2017, the national capital witnessed a different kind of protest staged by the farmers from Tamil Nadu. The farmers, who had demonstrated a 41-day protest in Delhi earlier in 2017, returned to Delhi with skulls and bones of the farmers – who had committed suicide – to resume their protest, demanding loan waiver and drought relief package.

September 2017 –Farmer Uprising in Sikar, Rajasthan

In September 2017, Rajasthan’s Sikar district, which has a profound history of mass movements, witnessed a massive farmer uprising. Thousands of farmers under the banner of AIKS occupied the streets and government offices to highlight their long pending demands.

Sikar protest

November 2017 -- Kisan Mukti Yatra by AIKSCC

In the run-up to the Kisan Mukti Sansad, AIKSCC led a Kisan Mukti Yatra covering a distance of more than 10,000 kilometers across the country to reach out to farming and non-farming communities, and trying to build unity between rural and urban India.

The first phase of the Yatra from Mandsaur culminated in Delhi covering six states: Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Uttar Pradesh and parts of Haryana.

The second phase covering Southern states Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Karnataka had started from Hyderabad on September 16, 2017, and concluded in Bengaluru on September 23, 2017.  The third phase – eastern leg –engaged with the masses from Odisha, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, South Bihar and West Bengal. 

The final phase covered the North Eastern states.

November 2017 -- Kisan Mukti Sansad

Lakhs of farmers from every corner of the country came to Parliament Street in New Delhi to fight for their fundamental rights that is being denied to them at every step. The two Kisan Mukti Bills emerged out of these struggles. These were moved  on loan waivers for farmers and remunerative prices for agricultural produce as private members’ bills by KK Ragesh, CPI(M) Rajya Sabha member and Raju Shetti of the Swabhimani Shetkari Sanghtana, respectively.

March 2018 -- Kisan Long March in Maharashtra 

The massive, seven-day Kisan Long March by the farmers of Maharashtra led by AIKS from Nashik to Mumbai drew the attention of the whole country for the massive participation of the poorest of poor farmer, including tribals and women in large numbers, many of whom walked barefoot.

August 2018 – 10 Crore Signatures Collected

On August 9 – the anniversary of historic Quit India Movement – AIKS’s campaign of collecting signatures of 10 crore farmers culminated across the country with farmers handing their charter of demands to District Magistrates, while asking  BJP to quit India: ‘Bharat Chhodo’. 

 November 2018 -- Kisan Mukti March

Thousands of farmers from across states landed in Delhi for Kisan Mukti March (Farmers Liberation March) organised by AIKSCC, demanding a 21-day special session of Parliament to discuss the raging agrarian crisis that has led to over 3 lakh farmers’ suicides and ruination of many more.

February 2019 – Kisan Long March 2.0

Close to 80,000 farmers from 23 districts of Maharashtra gathered at Nashik's Mumbai Naka for their second historic long march on February 20, to reach Mumbai on February 27, covering a distance of 180 kilometres— an average of 22 km per day. The call for the Kisan Long March was given by the AIKS.

Apart from these major actions, struggles by farmers have been going on in several states across India and have escalated during the six years of the Modi government, especially with regard to land acquisition norms made easier of several big corporate projects, such as bullet train etc and farmers left high dry with hardly any income, no remunerative prices for crops and now these three ‘black’ farm laws that have triggered countrywide outrage leading to a siege of Delhi’s border by protesting farmers.