December. That too under National Security Act, which was used for smugglers, terrorists and other anti-social elements! On 10 December in Suregao, near Hingoli in then Parbhani district rasta roko was organized by SS. Police started with lathi charge and then followed it up with firing. Three famers lost their lives. That issue was discussed in the winter session of the State Assembly at Nagpur for two hours and Chief Minister announced a judicial enquiry. It was done by Justice Malvankar of Bombay High Court but nothing came out of it which could satisfy the farmers. Joshi announced from the Jail that as planned the agitation would conclude with the three-hours of rail roko at Sewagram railway station near Wardha. That railway station was more or less at the centre of India and many important trains passed through it. Police blocked the roads at key junctions to ensure that the agitators could not reach Sewagram. But twenty to twenty five thousand farmers somehow managed to find their way to the railway track at Sewagram and threw themselves on the track blocking the rail traffic for three hours. They came in several groups. There were cotton fields on both sides of the railway line through which the farmers were finding their way in total secrecy. By the time police would arrest one group and dispatch it in buses to jail, another group would emerge to cover the railway track. Large number of buses was lined up along the railway track. It was a surprise for the police to see the agitators secretly reaching the tracks through the fields on both sides. ‘One after another the clusters of agitating farmers were emerging at the railway track as if coming out of soil,’ – this was the way police had described the scene in the Court later. As decided earlier the rail roko was concluded after three hours at 2 pm. One distinctive feature of this rail roko was that it was led When White Gold Turned Red
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