Nearly 10 days after he set himself on fire to protest the screening of 'Fanaa', Pravin Joshi succumbed to injuries at a hospital in Jamnagar.
AHMEDABAD/JAMNAGAR: Pravin Joshi, who had set himself on fire in the Ambar cinema in Jamnagar protesting the screening of Aamir Khan’s Fanaa on June 11, died after nine days in hospital on Tuesday morning. Joshi had been on ventilator for the past four days.
Following Aamir’s support to the Narmada dam project’s victims, the state BJP had banned his latest release Fanaa in Gujarat. But after a Supreme Court directive to provide protection to cinema halls screening the movie, the Ambar theatre in Jamnagar had been the only theatre in Gujarat to screen the movie. After six uneventful days, 30-year-old, Rajkot-based Pravin Joshi came to Jamnagar on Sunday afternoon and set himself on fire in a lavatory of the theatre.
Ambar theatre stopped screening the movie thereafter. Joshi, who was admitted with 80 per cent burns, succumbed to his injuries on Tuesday. An expert team of doctors had been sent to Jamnagar to examine Joshi, whose condition, according to the team, had improved for a few days, but deteriorated in the past four days.
BJP Yuva Morcha general secretary Amit Thacker said Joshi was the “first real martyr” for the 20-yer-old struggle of the Narmada dam project. “Pravin is Narmada’s first casualty.
The BJP will extend economic support to Joshi’s family. We have proposed to the Jamnagar Municipal Corporation to make a special tomb in his memory in the town,” Thacker added.
Owner of Ambar theatre, Vimal Madam, told DNA: “It was really sad. Political parties should refrain from provoking the youth into fanatical acts. India needs its youth in development, not such futile sacrifices.”
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