Amritsar: The situation remained tense Sunday as locals continued with their sit-in at Joda Patak where 59 Dussehra revellers were mowed down by a train. The locals had started protesting Saturday, raising slogans against the state government and demanding action against the train’s driver, a day after the accident here.
Police said locals are sitting on railway tracks and do not want to leave. “We hope that the normalcy will be restored in the area by Sunday evening as the number of protestors have come down since Saturday,” a senior police officer said. The Punjab Police has deployed its personnel, including commandos, to manage the crowd.
The Rapid Action Force is also present in the Joda Patak area. The district administration has said out of 59 people who were mowed down by the speeding Jalandhar-Amritsar train Friday, 40 have been identified.
The process of identifying the other persons is underway, it said. Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh, who visited the accident site Saturday, has ordered a magisterial inquiry into the incident.