Police fire tear gas and water cannons against thousands of Indian protesters (PHOTOS, VIDEO)

Police in India have resorted to water cannons and tear gas to disperse thousands of farmers protesting what has been branded unprecedented "agrarian distress," local media reports.

Some 20,000 farmers are understood to have taken part in the rally on Tuesday, organized by the Bhartiya Kisan Union (BKU), to call on the government to grant them a series of demands, ranging from absolute loan waivers to a cut in fuel prices which have recently skyrocketed.

Several people were reportedly injured after police tried to counter protesters with water cannons and tear gas shells at the border between Delhi and the northern Uttar Pradesh state. One person lost consciousness, according to the Times of India.

Ministers lashed out at the police action, with one saying it is reminiscent of the British treatment of Indian farmers during colonization.

Senior Congress leader Randeep Surjewala said: “On [the] birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi, Modi government has shown that it is no different from the pre-independence British government in India.

“British government then used to exploit the farmers and today Modi government is firing tear gas shells at farmers.”

The farmers are marching with a list of 15 demands, ranging from the assurance of a minimum income for farmers to a monthly pension of Rs 5,000 ($63) for small and marginal farmers who have reached the age of 60.

READ MORE: Thousands of workers rally in New Delhi for ‘biggest labor march in decades’

Congress Party of India leader Sitaram Yechury blasted PM Narendra Modi's “anti-farmers” protest and said: “Instead of providing relief to farmers they are exasperating the crisis further forcing farmers to be under debt burden and distress suicides.

“We haven't seen such an agrarian distress in India since independence,” he said, ANI reports.

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