Delhi will be shut down on March 20, says Jat quota protest leader

Yashpal Malik, president of the All-India Jat Aarakshan Sangharsh Samiti, has said that all roads leading to Delhi will be blockaded on March 20.

He said that the city would be shut down and that the supply of essential commodities would be cut off. 

Members of the Jat community were protesting Thursday at Jantar Mantar in Delhi.

Reports said there were thousands of them, with Jats from Haryana, Delhi, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh, Punjab, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh taking part.  

The Jats are demanding quotas, under the Other Backward Classes category, in government jobs and educational institutions. 

Malik said that 50 lakh Jats from 13 states would march on Delhi on March 20. 

He added that their protest would continue till their demands are met.

Apart from reservations, the Jats are also demanding the release of men arrested during last year's Jat agitation in Haryana, that the cases against them be withdrawn, and that the family members of the men who were killed during the agitation be given jobs.  

"Today we will apprise the government of our demands. We will march up to the Parliament and if necessary, will court arrest too," ANI reported Malik as saying Thursday.

"We will also announce the date of our march in Delhi in which 50 lakh Jats from 13 states will participate with their tractor trollies. It will be a historic moment. Our protest will continue until our demands are fulfilled," he added.

That date was later announced as March 20.  

The protesters had tried to march up to Parliament on Thursday too but were stopped by police, who had put up barricades at the Parliament Street police station. 

Thursday's protest was called off after that.  

But not before Malik warned that their protest would have serious repercussions.

"Supply of everything to Delhi will be cut off during our Delhi march," he said.

'It is for the government to find a solution'

Malik also lashed out at the Manohar Lal Khattar-led BJP government of Haryana for being insensitive to their demands.

"It is for the government to find a solution before or after the Holi. But seeing the insensitivity of the Haryana government, it looks like we have to prepare for a long fight," ANI reported him as saying.

(WION)