Security forces removing barricades to clear Shambhu, Khanauri borders
Mar 20, 2025 12:56 PM IST
Patiala range DIG Mandeep Singh says process of clearing Patiala-Delhi highway should be over by Thursday evening.
Following the eviction of protesting farmers from the Shambhu and Khanauri inter-state borders, security personnel in Haryana on Thursday morning started removing cemented barricades, which were erected to prevent Punjab farm protesters from heading to Delhi in February 2023.
A day after Punjab Police detained farmer leaders Sarvan Singh Pander of the Kisan Mazdoor Morcha and Jagjit Singh Dallewal of the Samyukta Kisan Morcha (Non-Political) when they were on their way back from Chandigarh to Shambhu and Khanauri protest sites following talks with the central delegation, including Union agriculture minister Shivraj Chouhan, that ended in a deadlock, the Punjab and Haryana police started the process of evicting the borders of protesters. The next round of talks is slated for May 4.
At the Shambhu border, JCB and other machines have been deployed to remove the concrete blocks to clear the Shambhu-Ambala stretch of the highway, that has remained closed for more than a year.
Haryana security officials had fortified the state border with Punjab with cement blocks, iron nails and barbed wire to scuttle any attempt by the farmers to move towards the national capital as part of their Delhi Chalo protest.
Police also resumed its operation to dismantle the remaining temporary structures on the Punjab side of the Shambhu border on Thursday.
Patiala Range deputy inspector general (DIG) Mandeep Singh said: “We are in the process of clearing the Patiala-Delhi highway and should hopefully be done by this (Thursday) evening. We are allowing farmers to come and take back their tractor-trolleys after providing details, such as their residential address and mobile number.”
More than 3,000 police personnel have been deployed on the Punjab side of the Khanauri border, he said.
On the Haryana side, Jind police have started the process of removing cement blocks near Datta Singhwala.
Narwana deputy superintendent of police Amit Bhatia said efforts were on to clear the Patiala-Delhi highway for traffic at the earliest.
