Mumbai: Two women narrowly escaped falling into an open manhole in Bhandup on Wednesday. The video of the women falling in was recorded by a CCTV camera in the area and this footage found its way online and went viral.
The video shows the women, one and then the other following shortly after, taking a tumble as they walk on a flooded pavement during the rains on Wednesday; the first woman is startled to find herself slip in but manages to get out and move on. About thirty seconds later, the second woman takes the same route and also falls in, looks about for help but eventually manages to pull herself out to safety. The path was submerged and there was no sign indicating the open manhole, a disaster waiting to happen.
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MP from Mumbai north-east constituency, tweeted the video and blamed the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) for the accident.
“The richest civic body of India BMC is incapable of keeping unclogged manholes, clean sewerage. The Mumbaikars are devoid of basic rights of cleanliness and now the incompetence is proving fatal. The video of two females falling in open manholes at Bhandup rages me to the core,” Kotak tweeted.
“For the past few years, the incidents of injury and death of persons caused by falling into open manholes during monsoons have increased. We can see in the video that the women escaped death narrowly and it’s high time the civic administration starts working towards filling these manhole gaps,” Kotak said on Thursday.
A day after the incident, Municipal Commissioner Iqbal Singh Chahal ordered a citywide manual inspection of manholes. In a statement, the BMC also said that the manhole in question in Bhandup was covered immediately on Thursday morning. “Manhole covers and openings of drains are inspected and repaired every year during pre-monsoon inspection. However, following the heavy rain on Wednesday, the civic administration has ordered immediate re-inspection of manholes,” said a senior civic official.
The official said that the inspection would be carried out at the ward-level and the operation would be supervised by Additional Municipal Commissioner (Projects) P Velrasu.
“All the ward officers have been instructed to carry out the inspection and submit a report within 24 hours,” said the official.
