Langar Baba passes away; pall of gloom in Chandigarh,Patiala
Kanwar Inder Singh/ royalpatiala.in
The Punjab Governor and Administrator, UT, Chandigarh, Banwarilal Purohit expresses deep condolences over the demise of Chandigarh’s ‘Langar Baba’ Jagdish Lal Ahuja.
86 years old Ahuja was recently conferred the Padma Shri for Social Service. After the post-mortem at PGIMER, the body was taken to his house in Sector 23 and the cremation was carried out at Sector 25.
For over two decades, Ahuja served free food (Langar) outside the Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research (PGIMER) here and later at the Government Medical College and Hospital, Sector 32. He has been feeding nearly 2500 people a day, without a day’s break for all these years.
Born in Peshawar, Ahuja moved from Pakistan to Patiala with his family during Partition in 1947. At 12, he was a refugee overnight. He started selling boiled candy to help his family make ends meet. In 1956, the family moved to Chandigarh. Here, he sold bananas and became prosperous.
Appreciating the fact that ‘Langar’ continued to be served despite his death, as per his last wishes, the Governor prayed to the Almighty to grant eternal peace to the departed soul and give strength to the family, friends and well wishers to bear this irreparable loss.
PGIMER expresses deepest condolences on the sad demise of Padmashree Jagdish Lal Ahuja, popularly known as Langar Baba, who will be remembered for his exceptional generous gesture of feeding lakhs of people outside PGIMER premises and for his endearing and humane personality.
PGIMER salutes Langar Baba’s magnanimity and ‘spirit of giving’ and prays to Almighty to give peace to this departed noble soul and strength to his family and thousands of his admirers to bear this irreparable loss.
Langar Baba passes away; pall of gloom in Chandigarh,Patiala. In 2015, Ahuja sold his seventh property worth ₹1.6 crore to arrange money for his noble initiative. He has sold six other such properties worth crores to ensure that poor don’t go to bed on an empty stomach.
november 29,2021
