'Fight' will last till last breath, says Dallewal whose fast completes 28 days for farmers' rights

Chandigarh, Dec 24 Jagjit Singh Dallewal, who has been fasting for the past 29 days for farmers' rights and lost 15 kg, reiterated on Tuesday that he would continue the fight till their demands are either accepted or the last breath.

In an appeal, while lying on a cot brought on the dais at the Khanauri protest site, bordering Haryana where farmers have been staging sit-in protest since February 13, Dallewel, whose vital organs have been deteriorating owing to fast and elderly age, said this battle should be fought in unison, indicating other states should also join the call of the protest of the farmers belonging to Punjab.

"I am well...We have to win this war unitedly," said Dallewal, 70, whose health is being monitored round the clock by a team of doctors who have already warned that the farmer leader is at risk of cardiac arrest.

Due to the hunger strike for 29 days, his immunity has been going weak day by day, putting him at risk of infection, a doctor told the media.

"His vital organs like liver and kidneys are going weak and the condition is deteriorating," said the doctor who examined Dallewal at the Khanauri border, adding the ketone levels in his body were quite high as per the latest test report, enabling him vulnerable to infection.

Dallewal, 70, who started his hunger strike on November 26 over demands, among others, to implement a legal guarantee for minimum support price (MSP) on crops by the Centre, said the government should not be allowed to remove the farmers from the protest site.

"Either we will fight for our demands or we will die here," he said in a brief address on a loudspeaker with his fading voice, echoing confidence by saying, "Now the big brother (Haryana) has joined the protest."

Dallewal, who was among the key leaders behind the farmers' agitation against the three contentious farm laws in 2020-21, now scrapped, is also the face behind the latest 'Delhi chalo' march by Punjab farmers.

The farmers have been camping at Shambhu and Khanauri borders between Punjab and Haryana since February 13 after their march to the national capital was foiled by security forces.

On the orders of the Supreme Court, the Punjab government has set up a medical board comprising senior doctors from a government hospital in Patiala district for round-the-clock monitoring. A makeshift hospital has been set up at the protest site to deal with exigencies.

Supporting the cause of the farmers, Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann asked the BJP-led Central government to give up stubbornness and talk to farmers.

"The Central government should abandon its stubbornness and open the way for talks with the farmers' organisations... If Modi-ji can stop the war between Russia and Ukraine, then can't he talk to the breadwinners sitting 200 km away? What are you waiting for...?" CM Mann wrote on X in Punjabi.

Source: IANS