Shaheen Bagh Bilkis activist ‘Dadi’ was turned away on Tuesday from the Singhu border between Delhi and Haryana.
Bilkis ‘Dadi’ had made headlines last year when she, along with other female residents of Shaheen Bagh, South Delhi, organized a sit-in against the contentious citizenship amendment bills, which turned into a movement Mass against legislation deemed anti-Muslim.
- News18.com
- Last update: December 1, 2020 9:20 PM IST
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Shaheen Bagh’s octogenarian activist Bilkis ‘Dadi’ was detained and escorted from the Singhu border between Delhi and Haryana on Tuesday when she tried to join hundreds of farmers protesting against the new agricultural laws.
Bilkis, popularly known as Shaheen Bagh Dadi, had expressed her willingness to join the farmers’ protest on the Delhi-Haryana border. “We are the daughters of farmers. We will go to support the farmers’ protest today. We will raise our voices, the government must listen to us, ”the elderly activist had said earlier in the day.
Shortly after arriving at the border point to extend her support to the agitated farmers, she was stopped by Delhi police personnel at the border. “She was detained at the Singhu border and the police escorted her back to her home in southeast Delhi,” said a high-ranking police officer.
Bilkis ‘Dadi’ made headlines last year when she, along with other female residents of Shaheen Bagh, South Delhi, staged a sit-in against the contentious citizenship amendment bills, which turned into a massive movement against legislation considered anti-Muslim. She was also recognized by the American weekly Time as one of the 100 Most Influential People of 2020 along with Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Bollywood actor Ayushman Khurrana.
At the peak of the protest in January this year, several Sikh farmers from unions in Punjab had shown up in Shaheen Bagh to provide support and set up a langar to provide hot meals to protesters.
Members of more than 30 farmers’ unions have camped on Delhi’s borders for six days and are now demanding a reversal of farm laws that they say will end the Minimum Support Price (MSP) system and leave farmers behind. at the mercy of companies.
Small producers fear that the new laws will make them vulnerable to competition from large companies and that they may eventually lose support for the prices of basic products such as wheat and rice.
India’s vast agricultural sector contributes nearly 15% of the country’s economy, valued at $ 2.9 trillion, and employs around half of its 1.3 billion people.
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