After announcing the closure of the Parliament session two days before schedule, the Modi government, sensing all-pervasive opposition within as well as outside Parliament, issued an ordinance to amend the 2013 Land Acquisition Act, putting an end to the provision for farmers’ consent before land acquisition. Immediately after this ordinance was issued, the All India Kisan Mahasabha strongly condemned this undemocratic and anti-farmer step of the Modi government and called for nationwide protests on 2 January 2015 demanding the repeal of this ordinance. Responding to this call, AIKM units across the country organized various protests.
In Uttar Pradesh, protests were held in the capital Lucknow, at Ghazipur district HQ, Jamania, Bhadora, Mhow district HQ, and Bareilly and at Moradabad, Pilibhit, Lakhimpur, Mirzapur, Kanpur, Banaras, Bhadouri, Sitapur, Kushinagar, Azamgarh and Mathura. Public meetings and protest marches were held in Giridih, Bagodar, Deori, and Ramgarh. In Jhunjhunu (Rajasthan), Bhind (Madhya Pradesh), Odisha, and in Durg (Chhattisgarh), memorandums were submitted by CPI(ML) demanding repeal of the ordinance.
In Andhra Pradesh, kisan marches, meetings, and effigy burnings were organized at several places including at the Eastern Godavari HQ Kakinada, in Karnool district, Krishna district, Srikakulam and Palasa, attended by farmers in large numbers. In Bindukhatta (Uttarakhand) farmers took out a protest march and burnt effigies of PM Modi. In West Bengal, protest marches, meetings, and effigy burnings were held at Darjeeling, North Dinajpur, South 24 Parganas, Hooghly, Nadiya and Bardhman.
In Punjab, 2 to 7 January 2015 was observed as protest week against the Ordinance, as well as against the Punjab government’s “sarkari, gair sarkari, niji sampatti nuksaan rok” Bill. Protest rallies and meetings were held at Mansa, Bhikhi Bazar, Gurdaspur, Patiala, Bhatinda, Ferozpur and Karnal.
In Bihar, protest marches and effigy burnings were held at 9 block HQs in Patna district. During the rally in Patna city, it was announced that 27 Jan to 12 Feb 2015 would be observed as “statewide Kisan fortnight” to protest against the ordinance and to demand purchase of paddy from sharecroppers at purchase centres across the state. Protests were also held in different parts of Bhojpur as well as in Aurangbad, Arwal, Bhagalpur, Jehanabad, Vaishali, Rohtas, Western Champaran, Jamui, Siwan, Samastipur, Nalanda, and Buxar districts.
