Mansa: Bhartiya Kisan Union leader Rakesh Tikait on Saturday urged the youth to carry forward the fight of anti-drugs activist Parvinder Singh Jhota, who was shot dead last week, as he met his family members in Mansa.
Addressing a gathering in the presence of Jhota’s father, Bhim Singh, the BKU leader said, “Parvinder Jhota fought against drugs. He wanted that youth and his state should be drug-free. He was murdered for waging a crusade against drugs. He is a martyr who laid down his life fighting against drugs”.
Tikait said stern action should be taken against those who are selling drugs. Everyone, especially the youth, will have to take this fight forward as a movement, he said. The farmer leader said the government should take steps to stop the drug menace and those who sell drugs should get punishment “for murder”, he said. Capsules, injections, all sorts of drugs are available, which is worrisome, he added.
Jhota’s family members and a joint action committee seeking justice for the activist have earlier maintained they will not allow an autopsy until Punjab Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann and DGP Gaurav Yadav step down.
“Whatever decision the joint action committee takes, we will support. We know what the family is going through at the moment,” Tikait said.
BJP leader Sunil Jakhar, who also met Jhota’s family, said the activist had sown the seeds of an anti-drug movement. Jakhar said people across Punjab were making every possible effort at their own level to fight drugs.
Jhota’s campaign against drugs gave a new direction to the fight against drugs; its purpose was not to target anyone, but to save Punjab from the scourge of drugs, the former state BJP chief said. He added that alarming conditions prevailed in every village of Punjab where some people were dying because of drugs, others were being killed for fighting against them.
Jhota’s father, Bhim Singh, on Saturday demanded the transfer of Mansa SSP Vaibhav Chaudhary, and refused to attend meetings with the district administration in his presence as the deadlock over the post-mortem of the activist’s body continued. Bhim Singh alleged that the police had failed to act promptly after his son was shot and demanded a probe into the role of the officers concerned.
He also said that while the administration has claimed they have suspended some officials, the family has so far not been provided with a copy of the government orders.
Jhota’s family has refused to perform the last rites of the anti-drug activist, whose body is lying at the mortuary of the civil hospital in Mansa, until justice is delivered. A three-member committee of women IAS officers Navjot Kaur, Kanwalpreet Kaur Brar and Apnit Riyat met Jhota’s family and the joint action committee for the third time on Friday.
Later, Riyat told reporters that the family has been apprised that the state government has already acted on several of their demands, such as handing over the investigation to the CBI.
Known for raising his voice against drug abuse and illegal sale of addictive substances at chemist shops, Jhota was shot in broad daylight inside a medical store at a busy marketplace in Mansa on October 13.
Ashwani Kumar, the store owner who opened fire on Jhota after he questioned him for selling addictive drugs to an elderly man, was taken into custody from Salasar in Rajasthan.