New Delhi, Sep 27 (IANS) A farmer, who was protesting at the Singhu border against the three contentious farm laws, died due to cardiac arrest on Monday, the police said here.
The deceased farmer, identified as Baghel Ram, 55, was a resident of Khela village in Punjab and was a member of Kirti Kisan Union (KKU).
Another KKU member Raghuveer Singh said that Baghel Ram was not keeping well for some time and was taking rest in his tent.
The police said as soon as they received information about Baghel's death, they rushed to the spot and took him to a nearby hospital where the farmer was declared brought dead. After the post-mortem it was learnt that the farmer died due to heart attack.
Earlier there were reports of chaos due to farmer's death, but the police denied all such reports.
His death comes on a day of countrywide strike by farm unions.
The Samyukt Kisan Morcha (SKM), a consortium of 100-odd farmers unions from across India, 15 trade unions and several political parties have jointly called a Bharat Bandh from 6 a.m. till 4 p.m. on Monday to mark the first anniversary of what they termed as a 'Black Day' when the President of India had given his assent to the three farm laws last year.
At the Singhu border, there were a large number of tractor trolleys parked but there were relatively very few people. This is one of the places where farmers have been sitting on protest since November 2020. Around two-and-a-half km long stretch of Delhi-Karnal highway (at Singhu village), where a large number of farmers was always seen during the last few months, on Monday bore an almost deserted look. Even the two stages erected for regular speeches and rallies were almost empty.
Jagdish Singh, a farmer from Ludhiana (Punjab) said, "Trolleys are vacant because people living in them have gone to block roads at Tikri and Delhi-Haryana border."
"By evening the situation will be different and more and more people will be here," Singh, who was busy preparing food for the protesters, told IANS.
People, who were at the Singhu protest site, were seen busy either preparing food or cleaning their tents.
Security at the outer premises of Singhu protest site has been strengthened with multiple teams of Delhi Police and Central forces deployed. People going towards Singhu from Delhi have to take a long circuitous way as the entry on the Delhi-Karnal Road (at Singhu village) has been prohibited.
Senior SAD leaders Prem Singh Chandumajra, Maheshinder Grewal and Daljit Cheema on Tuesday said it was most unfortunate that even after admitting that some wrong elements wanted to defame the 'kisan sangharsh', Rajewal had neither secured an unconditional apology from those guilty of hooliganism nor subjected them to the process of law.
The Prime minister further said that the visit would be an occasion to consolidate relations with our strategic partners - Japan and Australia - and to take forward our collaboration on important global issues. In a departure statement, the Prime Minister said he will be visiting the US from September 22-25 at the invitation of President Joe Biden.
The Director-General of WHO Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said that it is an important development in support of reaching the 40 per cent vaccination target in all countries by the end of this year.
The charge made by the BJP functionary comes a day after Kejriwal during his visit to poll-bound Goa on Tuesday, announced 80 per cent reservation in private sector jobs, Rs 3,000 and Rs 5,000 doles for the unemployed youth and families who have lost employment due to Covid respectively as well as setting up of a Skill university in the state.
Even as he reiterated his intention to counter any move to make Sidhu the state's Chief Minister face, Amarinder Singh said he will pit a strong candidate against him in the 2022 Assembly polls to ensure his defeat.
The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders in Goa have been engaged in a war of words and pre-poll announcements over the last few months ahead of the state Assembly polls, which are due in the coastal state in early 2022.
