The Essential Commodities (Amendment) Act, 2020<\/a> . They were first passed as ordinances on June 5, 2020, then introduced as farm bills in Parliament on September 14 and hastened into Acts by the present government on the 20th of that month.<\/p>\nThe farmers see these laws as devastating to their livelihoods by expanding the space for large corporates to have even greater power over farmers and farming. The laws have also been criticised as affecting every Indian as they disable the right to legal recourse of all citizens, undermining Article 32 of the Constitution of India.<\/p>\n
\u201c Yeh kisan hai<\/em> [these are farmers],\u201d says 52-year-old Rita Arora, who sells badges, flags and stickers related to the farmers protest on a street about 1.5 kilometres from the Singhu border. \u201cThese people have been sitting out in this terrible cold for so many days. When the government asks for votes before the election, they promise good things. But when they come to power? Look at the perils these three laws passed by the government pose for these people. We get our food from farmers. It\u2019s impossible to ignore them.\u201d<\/p>\nRita had a tiny shop near the India Gate in New Delhi, where she used to sell cold drinks, chips, cigarettes and more. Her business was badly hit during the pandemic, and after shouldering a heavy financial loss, she decided to come to Singhu to try and earn an income. \u201cI was selling shoes at the beginning [of the protests],\u201d she says, \u201cand didn\u2019t know about the laws or why the farmers were protesting. But then I talked to people and understood the laws. I realised that whatever the government has been doing is wrong.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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She does not earn much now, but is happy to be here. \u201cMy income is just around 200-250 rupees a day. But I do not regret it at all,\u201d she says. \u201cI am happy that I am part of this protest. I request the government to repeal the farm laws immediately.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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About a kilometre away from Singhu, Deepak has been selling socks on the streets. He travels every day by autorickshaw to set up his makeshift shop at the border. He also grows cabbage on the small patch of land he owns in Kundli municipal council area. \u201cMore than two months have passed since the protests began here. My income has gone down sharply. I used to earn 500-600 rupees a day before the protests, but now I earn barely 200-250 rupees a day. But please don\u2019t think that I won\u2019t support the farmers. Their problems are much greater than my own,\u201d says 35-year-old Deepak.<\/p>\n
Also roughly one kilometre from the Singhu border, Khushmila Devi, 40, and her husband Rajender Prajapati, 45, run a tea stall. They commute six kilometres every day from Narela in New Delhi, and have seen their income drop drastically with the continuing protests. \u201cWe used to earn about 10,000 rupees a month, but now that\u2019s fallen to just 4,000-6,000 rupees. Moreover, the route from Delhi to Singhu has been barricaded since January 26, adding to our problems. But still, we support the farmers,\u201d says the couple.<\/p>\n
\u201cFirst, they [the government] brought demonetisation,\u201d adds Khushmila. \u201cThen they imposed GST, and then came the pandemic and lockdown, when we suffered for several months continuously. Besides, the prices of all commodities are rising. The farmers provide us food. They are the basis of our existence. If we don\u2019t stand by them, then who will?\u201d<\/p>\n
This article was first published by the People\u2019s Archive of Rural India.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\nThis post was originally published on Radio Free<\/a>. <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PHOTO \u2022 ANUSTUP ROY. \u201cThe company people are certainly irritated with the protest happening here. It has badly affected\u00a0 transportation and the business is running poorly,\u201d says 22-year-old\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2577,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[22,4],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53003"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2577"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=53003"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53003\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":53004,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53003\/revisions\/53004"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=53003"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=53003"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/radiofree.asia\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=53003"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}