Trade forum members extend help to victims

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, October 21

In a nobel gesture, the Traders Forum Jalandhar today decided to help the owners whose shops were gutted on Diwali.

The members of the forum offered Rs 21,000 to the victims. The members had gone to see the ground reality and expressed their solidarity with the sufferers in this hard time.

Ravinder Dhir, president of the forum, sai they were up to provide any kind of help to the victims. Member of Parliament Santokh Singh Chaudhary also visited the spot today and examined the situation.

Goods worth lakhs of rupees were destroyed in a Diwali night fire that gutted nearly 25 shops in the cloth market in Jalandhar city. No loss of life was reported in the incident.

The fire in the Sudama cloth market near Jyoti Chowk in Jalandhar started on Thursday night and spread quickly. Although, the Fire Brigade vehicles and personnel rushed to the spot soon after the incident, the market was engulfed in flames.

Traders said their losses ran into lakhs of rupees. Though the cause of the fire was yet to be ascertained, the market association president Balwant Singh said foul play could not be ruled out.