Middlemen-sponsored protests against the new farm laws in the name of farmers once again took an ugly turn in Punjab, targeting the Reliance Jio’s telecom services and infrastructures. The anti-social groups, despite Chief Minister Amarinder Singh’s appeals, have so far damaged 1,338 mobile towers in Punjab. According to reports, more than 176 signal transmitting sites were vandalised in 24 hours on Sunday alone. Following the attacks on Jio’s infrastructures, the mobile-internet services have been disrupted in the state, causing inconvenience to the consumers.
However, distancing themselves from the state-wide vandalism, the farmer unions have appealed to the rioters to stay away from such acts that cause inconvenience to the masses.
There are around 9,000 towers of Jio in Punjab. Khalistanis in the garb of protesters have cut the fibres-cables in various parts of the state. The Khalistani-backed middlemen groups also gave a call for boycotting Reliance Industries and Adani Group.
Even though both the companies are not involved in direct procurement from farmers, the Congress-leftist-Islamist groups have been propagating that the corporates like Ambani and Adani groups are the beneficiaries of the new laws, making them easy targets for vandalism and attacks.
The Punjab chief minister Amarinder Singh had on Friday appealed protesting farmers to not cause inconvenience to the general public with such actions and continue to exercise the same restraint as they had shown over the past several months of their agitation.
