Ramit Mehrotra, Pune
Three UPSC aspirants lost their lives after being stuck in the basement of a coaching centre in Delhi’s Old Rajendra Nagar gets flooded with drain water. The flooding occurred due to a drain burst from excessive rains in Delhi, on Saturday evening.
The remains of two female students and one male student were retrieved from the site during the rescue operation, conducted by the police, and the fire department. The bodies have been identified as Shreya Yadav of Ambedkar Nagar in Uttar Pradesh, Tanya Soni from Telangana, and Navin Dalwin from Ernakulam, Kerala.
The series of events unfolds as such- around 7 PM, the Delhi Fire Service receives a flash message about the flooding at Rau’s IAS Study Circle. Around five fire tenders arrived at the scene and divers from the Natural Disaster Response Force were also deployed. Despite the quick arrival of the rescue operation forces, there were challenges. The basement of the coaching centre was filled with 10 -12 metres of water within 10 minutes. This made it impossible for the students to escape.
Deputy Commissioner of Police, M Harsh Vardhan said that the matter is under investigation to understand how quickly the basement flooded with water.
Agitated students have protested and raised slogans against the lack of accountability and promptness in investigating the incident.
Delhi police have filed a criminal case. The senior officer says that the forensic team has been employed to collect any evidence and is committed to conducting an elaborate investigation into the issue.
On Sunday, the police detained the owner Abhishek Gupta and the co-ordinator, Deshpal Singh of the coaching institute and later, arrested them.
According to the officials, the coaching institute had permission to use the basement as a storage facility. The institute made it into a library instead. The mayor, Shelley Oberoi has directed the MCD commissioner to take strict action against the buildings that have violated the guidelines and bylaws and used basements for their commercial use.
Meanwhile, The harrowing incident has caused political rage in the city. BJP pronged AAP for showing sheer negligence on the issue. AAP’s Durgesh Pathak, MLA from Rajendra Nagar has assured the residents that the drain water is being cleared with the help of the pump.
Public Works Department Minister Atishi has ordered an inquiry into the incident and a report from the Chief Secretary within 24 hours.
Leader of the opposition and Congress leader Rahul Gandhi took to microblogging platform X to express his anguish on the incident, saying that the collapse of the infrastructure is the collective failure of the system. The ordinary man is paying the price of poor construction, town planning and abandonment of responsibilities.