As per their earlier declaration, thousands of farmers under the banner of the Akhil Bharatiya Kisan Mahasabha gheraoed the LalKuan tehsil in Nainital district of Uttarakhand on 1 April 2015. The farmers, angered by the indifference shown by the State government to the series of farmers’ agitations for the past three and a half months against making Bindukhatta into a municipality, started assembling at the Lalkuan tehsil from early morning with red flags and banners. They gheraoed the tehsil gate and expressed their extreme anger against CM Harish Rawat and Labour Minister Harish Durgpal. When the tehsil road was full to overflowing, the agitators climbed onto the roofs of the nearby residential complexes under construction. The participation of women and youth in the agitation was noteworthy.
In spite of the widespread people’s opposition, the State government passed the Bindukhatta municipality ordinance on 25 Feb 2015 in a hush-hush manner with a small notification to the effect in the newspapers after 15 days. Hundreds of Bindukhatta farmers protested in front of the Vidhan Sabha on 17 March and the CM Harish Rawat assured the farmers that their wish would be taken into consideration. But on 19 March the government appointed SDO Haldwani Bhabar as administrator of Bindukhatta municipality and Lalkuan Tehsildar as executive officer. The Kisan Mahasabha announced a ghera dalo-dera dalo and hunger strike against this decision. 26 people sat on a collective hunger strike, out of which 5 people continued the hunger strike further. A torchlight rally was taken out by 400 youth on 29 March. The tehsil ghearao programme was held on 1 April, and the formation of the municipality was also challenged in the High Court. The HC directed the State government to reply within 3 weeks how the municipality was formed without hearing the people’s objections. The tehsil gherao was led by Purushottam Sharma, Bahadur Singh Jangi, Rajendra Pratholi, Kailash Pandey, Bhuwan Joshi, Vimla Rothan and other kisan leaders.
The High Court has given 3 weeks’ time to the government to reply as to why Bindukhatta was made a municipality without proper hearing of people’s objections, the farmers would put their agitation on hold for 3 weeks. If, after that period, the municipality was not revoked, the agitation would be intensified and thousands of farmers would gherao the Labour Minister’s house.
The speakers exposed the claims of BJP leader Bhagat Singh Koshiyari who blamed the Congress at the centre for sending back the Bindukhatta revenue village proposal, by pointing out that during Koshiyari’s time as CM it was the Vajpayee government which was at the centre. The truth is that no government—neither BJP nor Congress—has sent the required proposal to the centre. The BJP leadership and Leader of Opposition Ajay Bhatt have not opposed the Congres on this issue because they are hand in glove with the land mafia and in favour of the Bindukhatta municipality. Finally party leaders made the people on a 8 day hunger strike (Mangal Singh Koshiyari, Kunwar Singh Chouhan, Sher Singh Koranga) and on a 5 day hunger strike (Vipin Singh Bora) break their fast with fruit juice.
The party and kisan leaders expressed appreciation on behalf of the farmers of Bindukhatta to the public, parties, organizations, and media for their support to this cause. While the farmers are enthused by the HC directive of asking the state government to reply within 3 week, the morale of Harish Durgpal and his cronies has fallen. Congress activists gave vent to their frustration by burning the effigy of Com Purushottam Sharma. Other parties including AAP, Shiv Sena etc. have opposed the municipality, but their opposition is merely symbolic.
