Last Updated on 28/07/2024 by Ankita Jain
Three students died due to water logging in the basement of a coaching centre in Delhi. The incident took place at Rao IAS Coaching Centre in Old Rajendra Nagar. Education Minister Atishi of Delhi Government has ordered a magisterial inquiry into the incident.
The Delhi Fire Department received information about waterlogging in the basement of the coaching centre at 7 pm on Saturday evening. The call came that the basement was flooded and some students were trapped.
How did the basement get filled with water?
The library was built in the basement of the coaching centre. Due to this, the number of students here was high. According to fire department director Atul Garg, 30 students were present at the time of the incident, out of which 3 were trapped. After the rescue operation, the bodies of three students were recovered. Among the dead are two girl students and one boy student.
DCP (Central Delhi) M Harshvardhan told the news agency that there was heavy rain in Delhi on Saturday evening, due to which the road was flooded. Now the matter is being investigated as to how the basement got filled with water so quickly.
On the other hand, BJP MP from Delhi Bansuri Swaraj claims that the basement got flooded due to the drain not being cleaned. Bansuri Swaraj claimed that for the past week, the people here were repeatedly asking MLA Durgesh Pathak to get the drain cleaned, but their request was ignored. She said that the water from here filled the basement.
BJP leader RP Singh said that the desilting work here was not done on time. If the desilting work had been done on time, this accident would not have happened. He said that the Delhi government and the MLA should answer why the desilting work was not done and where did the money go?
The basement was filled with water in 2-3 minutes
Initial investigation revealed that there was a library in the basement, where many students were present. The basement suddenly started filling with water. The trapped students were rescued by throwing ropes.
A student said that when the library closed at 7 pm, as soon as we came out, water was coming from the front with very high pressure. By the time we vacated the library, the water had filled up to our knees.
He said that the flow was so fast that we were not able to climb the stairs. Within 2-3 minutes the entire basement was filled with 10-12 feet of water. Ropes were thrown to get out of there, but the water was so dirty that nothing was visible.
A police officer said that the basement was filled with so much water that the furniture in the library started floating. Due to this, there was a lot of difficulty in the rescue operation.
4 Water extracted from motor pump
Due to heavy rains, the road was already flooded. In such a situation, after the basement was flooded, a motor pump was used to remove it. It is being told that water was removed through four motor pumps.
At the same time, the help of divers was taken for the rescue operation. BJP MP Bansuri Swaraj said that if divers have been sent for rescue, then you can understand how serious the situation would be there.
After the bodies of the three students were recovered late at night, DCP M. Harshvardhan had said that seven feet of water was still filled and it was being drained out.
Now what?
According to DCP Harshvardhan, the bodies of the three students have been sent for post-mortem. The police have registered a case and detained two people. Meanwhile, Delhi’s Education Minister has ordered a magisterial inquiry into the entire incident. Along with this, he has also sought a report within 24 hours.