Farmer unions call meeting on Oct 28 to decide on protests at petrol pumps

Sukhmeet Bhasin 
Tribune News Service
Bathinda, October 24

Farmer unions will hold a meeting in Bathinda on October 28 to decide on whether they should continue to protest against private petrol pumps, farm leaders said on Saturday.

Representatives of Reliance and Essar petrol pumps dealers in Punjab met farmer leaders from Bhartiya Kisan Union Ekta Ugrahan as they negotiated terms for allowing petrol pumps to function normally. Farmers have cut off oil supply from private pumps since October 1 in an attempt to escalate protests against controversial farm laws that the Parliament passed last month.

Dealers of these companies had sent letters to the unions entreating them to allow their petrol pumps to function normally.

Shingara Singh Mann, a leader from BKU, said the meeting on October 28 will consider whether to allow petrol pumps to function.

Farmers have barricaded private dealerships in the state as a pressure tactic---a move that dealers claim has brought down sales by half, and in some cases, completely.

Private dealers have since been posting messages and videos on social media asking them to allow them to function normally.

A private dealer said on the condition of anonymity that he was staring at huge losses

“My petrol pump has been closed for a month now. By boycotting our petrol pumps, the farmers are causing a direct loss to dealers like us, not the owners,” he said.