Ration queue swells, cops resort to lathicharge in Ludhiana

By-Sourav Arora
LUDHIANA: Police resorted to mild lathicharge to disperse people, who had gathered in large number to get government ration at a stall set up by the food supplies department near a private school in division number 3 on Thursday. Amid the chaos at the venue, there was hardly any taker for social distancing norms.
One of the locals who had come from gaushalla road said that he had come to the venue at 6am to get ration. As the gathering swelled, police started announcing that only those who had come from surrounding areas would get free ration. There were many who had come from Daresi, Haibowal, Focal Point, Giaspura, Sherpur areas. They were all asked to leave. This however annoyed many of them who refused to leave and began to create a ruckus.
Sensing unrest, cops started forcing people to leave the spot and even lathicharged some of them.
Police officials said they resorted to lathicharge as it had become difficult to control the swelling crowd of around 2,000 persons. “The situation could be brought under control after the using force,” they maintained.
A cop deployed at the venue said police used restrain and ensured that the women who were part of the crowd don’t not get hurt. They added that even those distributing the ration were scared about uncontrollable crowd.
Satish Kumar, SHO, division number 3 police station, said a mild force was used to disburse the crowd as people refused to comply with the repeated appeals. The SHO said that a tent has been set up for distribution of ration among the needy people.