FARM WORKERS PROTEST, TRY TO GHERAO CAPT’S RESIDENCE

PATIALA/SANGRUR : On the last day of their three-day-long protest, farm labourers on Wednesday held a protest march towards the residence of chief minister Captain Amarinder Singh in Patiala. Police, however, stopped them at a distance as all the roads leading to the CM’s residence were barricaded.

Farm labourers under the banner of Sanjha Majdoor Morcha are demanding waiver of their loans and electricity bills, allotment of residential plots to the landless, increase in old age and widow pension to ₹5,000 and scrapping of three contentious farm laws.

Lachaman Singh, a morcha activist, said the labour unions will hold three-day-long protests outside residences of cabinet ministers across the state from September 1.

Meanwhile, the morcha refused to cremate the body of 62-year-old Gurtej Kaur from Bhunder village in Bathinda district, who had died during the protest on Monday, seeking financial assistance to her family. Labourers demand a compensation of ₹5 lakh and government job to next of the kin and waiver of her pending financial liabilities.

Farmers oppose BJP’s Teej festival in Sangrur

A group farmers on Wednesday blocked the gate of Government Ranbir College, Sangrur, where BJP’s Mahila Morcha had organized a Teej festival. Protesters in good numbers reached outside the venue where BJP’s Mahila Morcha state president Mona Jaiswal and district chief Meena Khokar were expected to reach. Police stopped the farmers at the gate of the college. Jaiswal skipped the event.