This Article is From Jan 26, 2011

Mirchpur residents' eleven-day agitation ends

Jind: The eleven-day long agitation by residents of Mirchpur and adjoining villages protesting for a fresh probe into the killing of two Dalits today ended after talks between leaders of the protesters and Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda concluded on a positive note.

The agitation resolved after talks between Bhag Singh Jalabh, convenor of the 41 member committee constituted by Sarvjatiya Sarvkhap Mahapanchayat, and Hooda, in Kaithal last night.

Jalabh said the meeting with the chief minister was held in a cordial atmosphere and they had decided to lift the blockades at Jind and other places.

Members of the pre-dominant Jat community had been sitting on the tracks at Julani village near Jind railway station since January 15, disrupting railway traffic on the Jind-Jakhal section of the Delhi-Ferozepur route.

Following the truce, the agitators removed barricades they had used to block the national highways and important road links here. They also vacated the Delhi Ferozepur rail line in the evening, which they had occupied since the last 11 days.

Jalabh said he had full faith in the system of delivery of justice and assured full cooperation to the government and the administration in maintaining peace and brotherhood, adding if the government failed to act on its assurance, the agitation would be relaunched.
       
The villagers were protesting against the booking of 98 members of their community in a case relating to the killing of 70-year-old Dalit Tara Chand and his teenaged daughter Suman in Hisar district's Mirchpur village on April 21 last year.
       
Rail traffic on various sections, including Jind-Rohtak and Hissar-Bhiwani is expected to be restored soon after inspection of the tracks, railway sources said.
       
The locked depot of the Haryana Roadways here was also reopened and bus services would be restored soon, officials said.
       
A Delhi court on January 9 had directed the Haryana Government to move all the 98 accused from Hisar jail to Tihar prison since their trial was transferred to a court in Delhi following a Supreme Court order, after the aggrieved party had moved the apex court claiming that a fair trial was not possible in Haryana.
       
The protesters have been demanding that the probe be held by a Special Investigation Team (SIT) either at Rohtak or Hisar and the accused be lodged in either of the two jails.
 
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