Three days after a 37-year-old man died after falling into an open manhole in the Sheetal Nagar area of Mira Road, the Thane (rural) police have booked the road works contractor and an official attached to the Mira Bhayandar Municipal Corporation (MBMC) for negligence.
The police are yet to arrest the culprits. The deceased who has been identified as Mohammed Shehzaad Bachhu Khan (37) was unmarried and worked as a painter in the locality. Shehzaad was walking home when he accidentally stepped onto an open manhole which was covered with a plank instead of the fiber-made lids. This was on August 31. The plank gave away and fell into the yawning manhole.
The fire brigade and police personnel had to pull his body out from another chamber.
Based on the complaint filed by the younger brother of the deceased, the Mira Road Police had registered a FIR under Section 304 (a) which pertains to death by negligence, against the contractor Bhavesh and an yet-to-be identified officer who had shouldered the responsibility of inspections in the concerned division.
In a desperate attempt to cover-up the incident, it was reported that the deceased was allegedly in an inebriated state when the incident occurred. However, locals blamed gross negligence by the civic administration for the tragedy as it could have been anyone – including senior citizens or children – who may have met with the same fate due to the missing cover over the newly constructed drain, especially during the ongoing monsoon.
There are around 14,000 manholes in the twin-city. Many of them are either lid-less or have broken covers. Despite witnessing a number of accidental deaths involving open and broken manholes in the twin-city, the civic administration and private contractors seem to be doing precious little to seal these yawning death traps. While the PWD handles the job, the onus of day-to-day supervision and keeping track of the lids on manholes rests on the shoulders of the ward officer and the sanitary inspector.
