Relocating tents, keeping farm movement memories alive

For over a year, a 2,400-square-foot tent at the Singhu border was home to Gurinder Singh, Butta Singh Shadipur and their fellow villagers who were protesting the contentious farm laws. On Friday, the two friends pulled down this pavilion of protest but said they intend to rebuild it at their village in Punjab's Bhatinda district to keep the memories of the movement alive.

As the farmers prepare to leave their protest sites on Delhi's borders on Saturday after the government repealed the farm laws and acceded to their other demands, many say they will reinstall their tents in their villages as a symbol of their long, arduous struggle.

When Gurinder Singh, Butta Singh Shadipur and 500 others from their Ram Nawas village reached the Singhu border on November 26 last year, they had to unroll their mattresses on the floor and sleep under the open skies.

Over the next few months, the two built a makeshift structure that has three rooms, a bathroom and a meeting area together measuring 2,400 square feet. They used bamboo for partitions and tinshed for roof.

Around 70-80 people would sleep in the meeting area and the three rooms every night.

They then brought television, cooler, gas stove, a small fridge -- everything they needed for a comfortable stay at what would be their home till the government conceded their demands of repeal of the three contentious farm laws and a panel on legal guarantee for minimum support price for crops among others.

Now, the two friends plan to rebuild the structure in their village to keep the memories of the movement alive.

"We spent around Rs 4.50 lakh on this structure. We had everything we needed. Now, we plan to shift it to our village and rebuild it," Gurvinder Singh said.

Butta Singh Shadipur said the structure will also serve as a memorial to those who died during the farm movement.

"We will also keep some of our pictures in it to remind us of the time spent here," he added, recalling the initial days of the movement when they faced tear gas shells, water cannons and batons.

Bakshish Singh, who managed a 10-bed 'Kisan Mazdoor Ekta Hospital' at the protest site, rode a wave of conflicting emotions as the protest draws to an end.

The smiles and hugs hide the pain of parting, Bakshish said.

The 30-year-old man from Patiala said the Life Care Foundation-run makeshift hospital started with one stool and medicines to control sugar and blood pressure.

"We scaled it up seeing that a large number of farmers, especially the elderly, had some health issues or other," Bakshish said.

The hospital recorded over a lakh OPD visits in the last one year and local residents accounted for more than 50 per cent of them, doctors said.

Free diagnostic tests were conducted at the facility for dengue, malaria, chikungunya, typhoid, etc.

"We got a lot of cases of heart attack and seizure. I can say the number of deaths during the protest would have been higher had the hospital not been there," the supervisor said.

The Life Care Foundation now plans to shift the hospital to a place near Jalandhar to provide free medical treatment to the needy there.

"We will take it down and reassemble it again. A part of the hospital will be converted into a museum having pictures and records of persons treated during the protest," Bakshish said.

The Samyukta Kisan Morcha, a forum of 40 farmer unions, Thursday announced that the stir will be suspended and the farmers would go back home in a victory march on December 11.

The announcement came after the Centre accepted most of the their other demands, including withdrawal of "fake case" against farmer protesters.

Jarnail Singh from Mohali said they had built two temporary structures with bamboo and tarpaulin for around 500 people from 12 villages.

"It cost us Rs 4 lakh -- Rs 2 lakh for each structure. Everybody contributed something. Inverter battery, air conditioners, television we had everything," he said climbing a ladder to take the tarpaulin off.

Jarnail Singh and others now plan to reassemble the structure in Buta Singh Wala village as a symbol.

"We will plant a lot of flowers around the structure...make it more beautiful. We will also keep one of the tractors we drove to Delhi there," he said.

Sardar Gurmukh Singh of the Bharatiya Kisan Union (Doaba) built a structure with bricks and cement mortar having three rooms in March.

Since Friday morning, at least five persons have been working non-stop to dismantle it.

"I spent around Rs 4 lakh on the structure. We can salvage around 20,000 bricks which will be used to build a memorial to those who died here," he said.