Graffiti News
Punjab graffiti draws scrutiny after activist’s killing
Graffiti brought a local allegation into public view
Graffiti in Doomwali village on the Punjab–Haryana border alleged easy availability of drugs amid protests following the killing of anti-drug activist Parwinder Singh Jhota, according to Times of India’s October 25, 2026, report. The newspaper located the writing in Nar Singh Colony and reported the slogan “Chita hi Chita”. Its account connected the words to allegations about access to drugs, while also carrying a police response that disputed the message’s credibility.
For people following writing in public space, the significance lies in the way a short inscription carries a contested local claim beyond the wall where it appears. In the newspaper’s account, the slogan entered a wider debate about drugs and policing. Reading that inscription requires keeping the allegation, residents’ concerns and the police response together. The words alone do not establish the extent of drug availability or resolve the dispute over the writer’s purpose.
Residents’ concerns accompanied protests in Mansa
An unnamed villager told Times of India that residents of Nar Singh Colony felt insecure and feared their children might become dependent on drugs. The villager attributed those concerns to what the resident described as easy access to drugs in the locality. Those statements represent a resident’s account of conditions and anxieties, rather than an independently established assessment of everyone living in the colony.
The newspaper placed the village report alongside gatherings in Mansa, which adjoins Bathinda. As of its October 25 report, people from across Punjab had been gathering there daily for 13 days to protest against drugs and demand action, according to Times of India. The report linked the protests to the aftermath of Jhota’s killing. That chronology gives the Doomwali inscription a particular setting: a dispute over drugs during a period of public demands for action.
The wall message and the gatherings are distinct elements of the newspaper’s account. Their shared context helps explain the attention directed at the inscription, without establishing that the person who wrote it represented the protesters or that the gatherings authorised the writing.
Police questioned the message and cited enforcement
Bathinda Senior Superintendent of Police Suhail Qasim Mir told Times of India that police had taken notice of the circulating graffiti and checked it. He placed the colony within the jurisdiction of Sangat police station. Mir said preliminary inquiries had identified the alleged writer and suggested that the person used drugs; he invoked that assessment to question the intention and credibility of the message.
Mir also raised the possibility that the timing and circumstances reflected an attempt to create a misleading impression of local conditions, according to the newspaper. That possibility was a police assessment. The alleged writer’s identity and intent should therefore remain attributed to the preliminary police account, alongside the resident’s separately attributed concerns.
The report also recorded 10 first information reports, or FIRs, concerning drug-related activities in Nar Singh Colony over the preceding 15 days. Times of India reported that a cordon and search operation had taken place in the colony about a fortnight earlier, supervised by Bathinda Range Deputy Inspector General Harjit Singh with the senior superintendent of police and additional deputy commissioner. Mir said police were examining the relevant circumstances to establish the facts.
An earlier inscription supplies a local comparison
Times of India reported a comparable wall slogan in Maur Kalan village, Bathinda, in November 2025: “Edhar chitta shareaam milda hai”. The newspaper translated its allegation as drugs being sold openly at that location. The earlier example supplies a dated comparison for the use of walls to voice allegations about drugs; it does not establish shared authorship or coordination.
For readers of public-space writing, Doomwali’s location and the dispute surrounding the words are more useful context than an aesthetic label. The account concerns a protest-related inscription carrying an allegation and a police challenge to its credibility. Nar Singh Colony in Doomwali is the location identified by the newspaper. Any reading of the writing should preserve that community context and the distinction between a slogan and evidence of the conditions it describes.
Explore other public-space works through Wallscape’s map.
Source: Times of India