Final Reflections on the Farmers’ Movement

Abstract

The end of the yearlong farmers agitation on November 19, 2021, led mostly by farmers from Punjab and Haryana at the borders of Delhi marked a tremendous success in its resistance to legislation of the central government and corporatization of agriculture in India. The movement defeated forces internal to India that favored agro-industries as well as larger global policy-making that favors the same. In India, such policies date back to at least the 1990s and the shift to “liberalize” India.1 As documented in the two previous issues published by Sikh Research Journal, the farmers’ movement witnessed participation from a cross section of the Indian population, cutting across societal, professional and geographical barriers. The farmers even traveled to various states of the country to influence state legislative elections of 2021 in an effort to defeat the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Although those efforts were successful only in some instances, the movement was able to create an alternative vision for the people of the nation. The movement brought together actors and groups with disparate interests and goals. Many observers have found those unexpected alliances and extensions in the movement to be noteworthy. Also, the success of the farmers’ movement can be attributed to Punjab’s long history of peasant struggles.