Former Chhattisgarh chief minister Ajit Jogi, who was on ventilator support since May 9 after suffering a cardiac arrest, passed away on Friday, informed his son Amit Jogi.
“20-year-old Chhattisgarh has lost a patriarch. Not just me, but Chhattisgarh and its citizens have lost a father,” Amit Jogi posted paying his respects on Twitter.
Jogi, 74, was admitted to Shree Narayana Hospital in Raipur after he collapsed in his home garden on May 9.
His condition worsened in the followed days and slipped into coma.
The doctors attending to him had started “audio therapy” by making him listen to his favourite songs on earphones, with neurological activities of Jogi, “almost nil” as he remained in coma.
According to the doctors, a sweet tamarind seed had got stuck in Jogi’s windpipe.
The doctors has been making all efforts to revive his brain activity but yielded no success.
A bureaucrat-turned politician, Ajit Jogi had served as the first Chief Minister of Chhattisgarh from November 2000 to November 2003 in then Congress government, after the state came into existence.
He quit the Congress in 2016 and launched a new political outfit Janta Congress Chhattisgarh (J).
Jogi had then accused the state Congress of working as the “B Team” of BJP. He had been sulking for some time following the expulsion of his son Amit, after some audio tapes purportedly indicated his involvement in fixing a by-poll in Chhattisgarh in favour of BJP.