In Ludhiana Sunday. Gurmeet Singh
His mortal remains never found after he perished during a building collapse due to fire in Ludhiana, firefighter Manpreet Singh (25) was remembered by his family and friends on Sunday at an inter-village football tournament at village Sirha. The entire village, including NRIs, Manpreet’s friends, panchayat and several others, pooled-in funds to organise tournament. On Sunday, four months after the incident, Manpreet’s father, Malkit Singh, was busy overseeing arrangements for Shaheed Manpreet Singh Open Football Tournament.
“The village youngsters have named sports club in Manpreet’s name. Now it will be called Shaheed Manpreet Singh Sports Club (Sirha). Today, we organised first football tournament and eight teams participated from different villages of Ludhiana and Moga. Now, it will be annual feature,” says Malkit, his eyes getting moist seeing photo of his son on jerseys and trophies. His wife Balwinder Kaur (65), who cannot walk, was present at the venue too, and saw the matches in progress.
Later, Manpreet’s parents gifted jerseys to nearly 70 children in the village who will now be trained in football. “These have been specially prepared with Manpreet’s photograph on them. I want village children to remember my son and his sacrifice,” added the proud father. “We have spent around Rs 1 lakh today and everyone has pooled in because Manpreet was son of the entire village. We have also hired a coach for our village children to train them in football. One villager Satnam Singh has donated desi ghee and almonds for diet of players. This year it is our first tournament so prize money for winner is just Rs 11,000….The amount might be small, but no one in village will forget his sacrifice ever,” said Pardeep Singh, Manpreet’s friend.
On November 20 last year, a five-storey building of a plastic factory had collapsed following a massive fire at Suffian Chowk of Ludhiana. Among sixteen persons killed, there were nine firefighters. The bodies of three firefighters, including Manpreet Singh (25) of village Sirha of Ludhiana were never found, from the debris. On the last day rescue operation, Malkit Singh (66) signed a statement to police saying that his son be declared dead. Harpreet Kaur, sister of Manpreet, said that his brother would have turned 26 on April 4 had he been alive. “We want children here to stay away from drugs. There wasn’t a better way to remember Manpreet than a sports tourney,” she added.
“Entire village went into deep shock as news of building collapse had came in. We were at least hoping for his mortal remains to be found. He was the first one ever to join fire department from our village. What we did today was nothing. It is a very small thing that we have done for his parents’ happiness. Entire village had lost a son when this tragedy happened,” added Pardeep. The parents, meanwhile, are still waiting for Rs 5 lakh compensation from the government. “We have received half amount of Rs 10 lakh announced by CM. Rest amount is still pending,” said the father. An invitation was also sent to local SAD MLA Sharanjit Singh Dhillon for Sunday’s event, but he could not make it due to ‘other urgent commitments’.