Congress and AAP spar over farmers agitation and protection of farmers at Delhi borders

The war of words between Congress and AAP has escalated further after the Republic Day violence followed by clashes among the protesting farmers and locals at the Singhu border. Punjab Pradesh Congress Committee chief, Sunil Jakhar on Saturday mocked the AAP's Raghav Chadha, claiming that the latter had asked to deploy Punjab Police to protect the agitating farmers at the borders of the national capital. Ridiculing the AAP's demands, Jakhar said even CBI cannot enter a state without state government's permission.

"Don’t you know anything about the principles and rules of police jurisdiction? How can a state police force enter Delhi or any other state, when even a central agency like CBI has no such authority or jurisdiction?" Jakhar said.

Further taking a dig at the AAP leader, Jakhar asked, "why doesn’t your AAP government in the capital send out the Delhi Home Guards, who report directly to the state government, to protect the farmers sitting at your doorstep? And with 66 MLAs spread around the city, why don’t you help out the farmers instead of wasting your time giving advice to the Punjab government."

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Farmers vs Local villagers at Singhu border

The spar of words between AAP and Congress comes after the clash at Singhu border between the protesting farmers and the local villagers who wanted the farmers to leave the protest site so the border roads could be opened for people's movement. 

The two sides pelted stones and attacked each other with sticks, leading to a further escalation in violence. The Delhi Police had to intervene which was met with stone-pelting. Thereafter, to control the escalating situation, the police was forced to lathi-charge the aggressive mob and fired tear gas shells. Several cops including SHO of Alipur suffered injuries in the clash at the Singhu Border. A protestor attacked the SHO with a sharpened sword causing injuries to him. However, AAP leader Saurabh Bharadwaj stated that the agitating farmer must have used the sword against the SHO in self-defence

While speaking exclusively to Republic TV, the SHO said that even after the protestor attacked him with a sword, he tried to save him from the villagers who came there to protest against these protestors for 'disrespecting the National Flag'. 

Cracking down on the attack at SHO Pradeep Paliwal at Delhi's Singhu border, Delhi police has arrested 44 people on Friday, including the man who rushed at Paliwal with a sword.  Farmers under the Sanyukt Kisan Morcha, continue to protest at Delhi's borders - Tikri, Singhu, and Ghazipur, often clashing with police and local protestors on their 64th consecutive day, against the farm laws.

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