On the day when the Singhu protest site saw violence, in a ground report by Aaj Tak, a crowd carrying Indian flags could be seen gathered at the border.

The reporter said that they (the crowds) claimed to be locals who were in support of the farmers’ protests but had subsequently decided to oppose the movement after the events of January 26.

Gradual digging up revealed the connections of some of the counter-protesters with the BJP, which has been blamed of being bent on tainting the farmers’ protests.

Amidst the crowd, was a man in a blue-white-green striped shirt holding the tricolour. He was in the front row of the mob facing policemen. He has been identified as Aman “Dabas” by several social media users.

Aman Dabas

Aman identifies himself as a social worker from North West Delhi. “Aman Kumar Social Worker” is the name of a Facebook page (included in the image) dedicated to his work. “Dabas” is a kinship group in the Jat community.

Last year, his page had uploaded pictures of him during door-to-door sanitization in Barwala village, Pooth Khurd, Ward No 31, in New Delhi. Aman is married to local Bharatiya Janata Party leader and municipal councillor of Ward No 31, Anju Kumar aka Anju Devi.

He had also been spotted at official BJP North West Delhi meetings. Aman and Anju used to be Aam Aadmi Party leaders until they joined the BJP in 2017.  Recently, Aman had uploaded a picture of himself with Home minister Amit Shah.

Details about Anju Kumar at the MyNeta site that tracks the records of political leaders states that she is a resident of Pooth Khurd, which is more than 15 km away from the Singhu border. The people assembled at the border claimed that the farmers’ gathering is a hindrance to daily work since it is causing heavy traffic in the vicinity and shop owners are unable to open stores. A village 15 km away, however, cannot be considered ‘neighbouring’ area.

Also See: Overview of the Farmers’ unions in the protests

Krishnan Dabas

A man named Krishan Dabas made a Facebook post about the violence that ensued at Singhu border on Friday. Alt News was able to download the post and take a screenshot before he took it down a couple of hours later. BJP leaders Sandeep Sehrawat and Ravinder Kumar were tagged on the post. Krishan seemsto be close to both of them. Krishan had uploaded a broadcast by News Nation where he identifies himself as a “local” protesting at Singhu border.He can be heard shouting “humara border khali karo” (clear our border) with a group of people, including Aman, who was spotted at 12 seconds. On the other side of this group was a large assembly of policemen in riot gear. In another video uploaded by Krishan, Aman could be seen in the front row of the mob gathered around policemen, same as in the Aaj Tak video. Both Krishan (1:45) and Aman (0:25) can also be spotted in the Aaj Tak video below. Last year, Krishan had uploaded a post from BJP West Delhi Pooth Khurd office with Aman’s wife, Ward 31 municipal councillor Anju Kumar.

Also See: Overview of Farmers’ protests- role of Charan Singh

There is another photograph of Aman and Krishan protesting against the Arvind Kejriwal-led Delhi government under the banner of the “Bharatiya Janata Party Delhi Unit”. Heavy stone pelting and vandalism were reported from the area even as the police was caught on camera as being mere spectators to the violence. In a previous fact-check, AltNews showed that a protest against the farmers at the Singhu border on Thursdayhad been organized by an outfit called the Hindu Sena. The organization’s founder and president Vishnu Gupta had issued a press release which stated, “Today, local Hindu Sena activists along with local area residents went to Singhu border amid farmers and raised slogans against Khalistan supporters and appealed to the farmers to clear the road.”

(Source: Alt News, Scroll)