The growing clout of illegal mafia had another victim in Punjab, when a 55-year-old women was crushed to death by a tractor trolley for protesting against illegal mining.
The victim Lacho Kaur of Shahkot village in Jallandhar was a regular voice local against mining mafia which has become very powerful in the state.
The Jalandhar police has registered a FIR with sections of murder under IPC section 302, against one Kuldeep Singh, a resident of Rame village after Kaur’s two sons and other family held demonstrations against police inaction. Earlier, the police had filed the FIR, against the accused, only with charges of negligent and rash driving on road.
According to the police: “We have registered a case on murder charges. We are trying to ascertain the reason of her death. Initial investigations have revealed there was a certain heated argument between the lady and tractor trolley drivers,” Yurinder Singh Hayer, SSP, Jalandhar (rural) said. .
According to the family of the victim, the drivers had visited their house twice to threaten their mother for raising voice against the illegal activities.
“For last few days, my mother had been fighting against their illegal mining activity,” they said.
The driver of the tractor twice visited our house and abused her. He threatened my mother to kill her if she dared protested against their activity,” the deceased’s 27-year-old son Jagdish Singh said.
It is worth mentioning that in November 2012, the Punjab and Haryana governments had ordered banning of illegal sand and stone mining from the riverbeds of Satluj in the Shahkot and Nakodar areas of Jalandhar.
Following this, the villagers in these areas have taken up fight against the mining mafaia. Earlier they had gheraoed 45 such mining trucks and had forced the police to impound the vehicles.