Bathinda, September 30
Newly appointed rural pharmacists faced the wrath of the men in khaki as they started raising slogans when Punjab Finance and Health Minister Surinder Singla completed his address at a health camp organised at Goniana Mandi, near here, today.
The police reportedly manhandled about 12 pharmacists and took them away from the venue. Sources said the turbans of pharmacist union leaders Sukhvir Singh Moga and Rupinder Raja also fell off in the subsequent melee. The sources said their protest led to chaos inside the pandal and some elderly
women, who had come for check-up, also faced inconvenience.
After the commotion at the camp venue, the Minister and the DC left for a Congress leader's function. But the protesting pharmacists got agitated. The sources said over 20 agitators gathered at a pandal erected on the way and started intense sloganeering against the Minister.
The police managed to control the agitators but one of the protesters also got injured in the police action and was later admitted to a hospital.
Police official Gurjeet Singh Romana said while some of the protesters were made to leave, others were taken to the Nehiawala police station. The police merely took preventive measures as they were trying to spoil the atmosphere.
Earlier, addressing a gathering, Mr Singla said the exercise was aimed at extending free treatment to people of the rural areas after their check-up at the camp. He said such camps would be organised in 141 blocks of the state and this was first in the series. X-ray, ultrasound and other tests were performed free of cost at the camp.
