The capital was served a reminder by farmers on Monday, eight months after they ended a year-long siege of Delhi.

The farmers reached the city for a one-day event with the same clutch of demands to underscore that the Modi government had not delivered on any of the assurances made in December.

This time, the mobilisation was much less because the farmers’ movement had split up following differences over the decision of some Punjab-based leaders to contest the Assembly elections.

On the streets on Monday was the group which goes by the name Sanyukta Kisan Morcha (Non-Political). Last week, the “parent group” — the Samyukta Kisan Morcha — held a protest at Lakhimpur Kheri against the delay in justice in the case of the mowing down of farmers by the son of a Union minister.

The Singhu, Tikri and Ghazipur borders — which had seen the maximum mobilisation during the year-long protest — were barricaded as the farmers arrived in the capital not only by road but also by trains over the weekend.

They held a day-long mahapanchayat at Jantar Mantar and submitted a memorandum to the President, in which they raised the spectre of another prolonged agitation if their demands were not met. The farmers dispersed after that.

In the memorandum, the SKM(NP) referred to the December 9, 2021, agreement of the central government with farmers, according to which they ended their agitation two days later and returned home.

“But till date, the government has not fulfilled the agreement. Cases against all farmers have yet to be taken back in courts in Uttar Pradesh, Punjab, Haryana and other states. Compensation is also pending in cases where police and state agencies have inflicted injuries on protesting farmers in other states. Not only that, the government is taking more anti-farmer policies, like negotiating free trade agreements,’’ the SKM(NP) pointed out.

While their original set of demands remains, the farmers on both sides of the divide have now added to their list the call for withdrawing the Agnipath scheme of temporary recruitment to the military.

Their reason for joining hands with those protesting against the Agnipath scheme is that many of those seeking these jobs are children of farmers. Through the farmers’ protest, they had maintained that “a soldier is a farmer in uniform”.

This apart, their demands are: justice to the farmer families who lost their loved ones in the Lakhimpur Kheri massacre and release of the farmers who are in jail for the violence than ensued and the arrest of Union minister of state Ajay Mishra Teni whose son allegedly mowed down four farmers; a law to guarantee minimum support price in line with the Swaminathan Commission report on “C2 + 50 per cent” formula (a broad-based method for calculating the cost of cultivation); withdrawal of the Electricity (Amendment) Bill 2022 and payment of sugarcane arrears.

They also want India to leave the World Trade Organisation (WTO) and cancel all free trade agreements.