Two Jalandhar families lose breadwinners to virus

Deepkamal Kaur

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, May 26

Tragedy struck two Jalandhar-based families with both losing all breadwinners to Covid in a short span. Both families have lost four members to the viral disease leaving behind women and children, who are completely devastated not just emotionally but also financially.

Three brothers, aged 45, 48 and 55 years and their septuagenarian mother from a family in Shaheed Babu Labh Singh Nagar succumbed to the infection in a matter of just a week. While 48-year-old Gurmeet Singh passed away on May 19, his younger brother Surjit Singh died three days later. This morning, their mother Mahinder Kaur and elder brother Avtar Singh also lost their battle against the disease.

Charanjit Singh, a relative, said, “Gurmeet’s daughter, who is married, had come to meet them and she perhaps had Covid then. She herself got cured but the infection proved too fatal for everyone else. The three brothers were engaged in small finance business. The women have never worked. It has been the worst tragedy I have ever seen.”

Another family based at Jyoti Nagar saw four deaths within three weeks. While it all started with Manmohan Kaur Bedi (76) falling prey to the infection on May 8, her husband Jagjit Singh Bedi (86) died the next day. The family was still recovering from the shock of the death of the two elderly when their elder son Kanwaljit S Bedi (55) passed away on May 16. Yesterday, Kanwaljit’s younger brother Manpreet Singh Bedi (52), who ran a popular stationery shop in Jalandhar, also failed in his fight against the infection.

The members of both families said re-building their lives would not be easy as the women lived in joint families and had never stepped out all their lives. The children, though all adults, are still not settled to bear the burden. 

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