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Ghaziabad: Work suspended on sewer line project where five workers died
The Uttar Pradesh (UP) water utility on Friday suspended work on the new sewer line laying project in Ghaziabad after five workers died while working at the site
The Uttar Pradesh (UP) water utility on Friday suspended work on the new sewer line laying project in Ghaziabad after five workers died while working at the site near Krishna Kunj Colony on Thursday afternoon. Earlier, the UP government had blacklisted the firm contracted for the project.
“We have suspended the work as of now as the government has blacklisted the contractor company which was taking up construction. It is still not clear whether the same company will finish the project or we have to re-tender the work and engage some other company. We will seek directions from the state administration and take up the work accordingly,” said GS Srivastava, chief engineer of the UP Jal Nigam.
The Ghaziabad police late Friday night said they arrested Monu Singh, 30, who if one of the officials of the contractor company. This is the first arrest made by the police in connection with the death of five workers.
“The man is a site engineer and is alleged to have not taken up the supervision at the site where the workers died. He is resident of Sanjay Nagar and formally arrested,” said Shlok Kumar, superintendent of police (city).
The UP government had also suspended four engineers of the UP Jal Nigam. According to officials, the sewer line project is estimated to cost about ₹88.75 crore, which includes the construction of over 47 km of sewer line.
“The manhole where the five workers died was constructed one month ago. There is no sewer flow under the entire 47km of the new network. The work for connecting 29km lines is complete. The incident is tragic and no one expected that the non-connected sewer may have gaseous formation which resulted in death of five workers at the site,” Srivastava added.
The Ghaziabad police had identified the five victims as Vijay Kumar, 40, his brother-in-law Shiv Kumar, 32, besides Horil, 35, Sanjeet, 30 and Damodar, 40. The officials said that one of the victims fell inside the manhole which is about 15 feet in depth and others, one by one, climbed inside to rescue them. However, they all got suffocated to death, the post mortem reports received by police on Friday said.
“We have come to know that the contractor company is a joint venture company with two firms taking up the work. We have directed that officials of both the companies should be named in the FIR,” said Manju Diler, the member of National Commission for Safai Karamcharis, who visited for an on site inspection at Ghaziabad on Friday.
According to UP Jal Nigam officials the new sewer network will cater to the residential colonies in an around Nandgram and the project is taken up under the Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation.
“The workers were not expert workers who could handle the sewer network. They had just the knowledge of plumbing etc. They were hired by the contractor. We have given a police complaint from our side too against the officials of the contractor company which is based in Ghaziabad,” Srivastava, added.
Meanwhile the Ghaziabad police so far registered two FIRs into the incident and planning to levy provisions of the Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe (Prevention of Atrocities) Act.
“The families of the victim workers have started to arrive from Samastipur, Bihar. Once they give complaints we will levy the provisions and a circle officer level will conduct the investigation. The post mortem report indicates that all five men died of suffocation,” said Shlok Kumar, superintendent of police (city).
