Ex-serviceman dies while waiting in bank queue for pension

Our Correspondent

Tarn Taran, December 5

An ex-serviceman died while waiting in a queue to get his pension from a bank at Chabal, 16 km from here, today.

The deceased has been identified as Malook Singh (65) of Cheema Kalan village. He had come to get his monthly pension from the branch of State Bank of India at Chabal.

Gurdial Singh, son of the deceased, said his father had gone to the bank around 6 am. Around 11 am, he suffered a cardiac arrest while standing in the queue. He died on the spot.

Malook Singh had been visiting the bank for the past four days regularly, but had to go back without taking the pension due to heavy rush at the bank.

Village sarpanch Monu Cheema demanded compensation for the aggrieved Dalit family. The Chabal police have lodged a report under Section 174 of the CrPC.

Customers stage dharna

In another case, hundreds of customers when denied cash by Punjab National Bank staged a dharna on the road, disrupting traffic for hours together today.

The customers had queued up outside the bank from early morning and were informed around 11 am that there was no cash in the bank.

Rakesh Kapoor, senior manager of the bank branch, said the cash would not be coming to the bank even tomorrow.

No pay, safai sewaks down shutters of bank

Sangrur: A group of safai sewaks of the municipal council on Monday protested against the authorities of a branch of the Sangrur Central Cooperative Bank in the grain market here. They downed the shutters of the bank branch for more than an hour in protest against non-payment of their salaries. Bank staff Pargat Singh said out of 220 safai sewaks, whose salary account is with the bank branch, they had already paid salaries to 210 safai sewaks and only 10 were left. OC