Plucky security guard dies in Vidyavihar building fire

Mumbai: Uday Gangan, a security guard, died in a fire at Takshashila building, while trying to extinguish flames. He is survived by his wife and two sons.

Mumbai: “I’d talked to him on the phone just a few hours earlier,” said a tearful Ujwala Gangan, wife of security guard Uday Gangan, 52, who died on Monday morning. “He had asked me to keep tea ready when came back from his night shift.”

Plucky security guard dies in Vidyavihar building fire

Uday, a security guard at the 13-storey Takshashila building in Neelkanth Kingdom Complex in Vidyavihar, was the only casualty in a fire that started at around 4.20 am on the second floor but whose origins are not as yet clear. “Before we could arrive, the security guard used the building’s second-floor fire extinguisher to try and extinguish the flames,” said a fire officer. “He might have got trapped in them.”

Having sustained 100% burns, Uday was declared Dead on Arrival at the hospital. “We were told that my father went to the second floor with a fire extinguisher along with the security supervisor. But just as they reached the floor, flames engulfed him,” said Prasad, Uday’s 26-year-old son. The security supervisor, 52-year-old Sabhajit Yadav, sustained 25-30% burns, but was in a stable condition at Rajawadi Hospital.

As per the building’s secretary, Abhay Gokani, after the residents of Flat 201 noticed the fire, one of them, Jitendra Jain, rushed to his house. “We immediately started to alert everyone in the building,” he said. “The fire brigade was called, and till then, residents were asked to go to their balconies.”

Jain had left his door open when he went to inform Gokani, causing the fire to spread through his home. His family of two children, two elderly parents and his wife were inside. “We called for a ladder, and as the first floor is also the podium floor, it was easy to get my family down,” Gokani explained. “We rescued a few others this way.”

By then, the fire had spread to the doors of the other five flats on the second floor. Gokani, along with Uday, attempted to reach the second floor by the stairs but was unsuccessful. “In that whole mess, we didn’t realise when the security guards attempted to go up again with the extinguisher,” he said. “We were told by Yadav that Gangan had got left behind. His body was found later.”

By then, the fire brigade had arrived and started operations. Smoke had spread through the passages of the building, but thanks to their balconies, residents had access to fresh air. Around 15 to 20 people between the third and fifth floors were rescued by the fire brigade’s external ladder and automatic hydraulic platform. Those on the floors above took advantage of the building being interconnected with other wings in the complex through the eighth-floor refuge area and terrace.

“Because the building was alerted quickly, people could be seamlessly evacuated,” said the fire officer. “There was also space in their balconies and refuge areas, and there were fire hoses on every floor, although the pumps were not working properly. It was only Flat 201 that was damaged.”

The fire was extinguished by 8.44 am.

Gangan used to work the night shift from 8 pm to 8 am, and had been working at the building for around eight years. He is survived by two working sons and his wife who is a domestic worker. “We will help out his family as best as we can,” said Gokani.