Thane: The heart-wrenching video of a wailing mother whose six-month-old baby slipped out of her grandfather’s arms into a nullah went viral earlier this week. The elderly man on Saturday recounted the harrowing moments and said he didn’t even realise when the child slipped out of his raincoat. The search operation was called off after two days even as the family hoped for a miracle.
The grandfather also said that had there been good hospitals in Bhiwandi, they need not have travelled to Mumbai to get treatment for the 6-month-old on such a rain drenched day. “It is a painful time for our family. My daughter lost her child. If there was a good hospital in Bhiwandi, we would not have felt the need to travel to Mumbai for my granddaughter’s treatment, and she would have been alive today,” he said.
The grandfather, Dnyaneshwar Paugul, was viciously and unfairly trolled on social media, with tweeple asking why the family stepped out of the stalled train during heavy rainfall.
Paugul said, “We were travelling to Mumbai to take my sick granddaughter to a hospital. The local train didn’t move for about two hours between Thakurli and Kalyan due to heavy rainfall. Some of the passengers were getting off and walking towards Kalyan. My daughter and I also alighted with the baby. First, my daughter’s foot slipped while walking on the tracks. I then took the baby from her but I also slipped. Suddenly the baby slipped out of my arms and was swept away by the strong current of the stream.” He said other people first noticed that the baby had fallen but by the time everyone realised what had happened, it was too late.
