15 minutes at a tea stall saves life of 21-year-old from Vishnu Garden roof collapse

For 21-year-old Rizwan Shah, whose mother was among the four killed in the factory roof collapse in Vishnu Garden, it was the 15-minute delay in reaching the factory,

For 21-year-old Rizwan Shah, whose mother was among the four killed in the factory roof collapse in Vishnu Garden, it was the 15-minute delay in reaching the factory, stopping at a nearby stall for a cup of tea, that saved his life.

HT Image

“I usually used to start work at 9.15am. On Saturday, however, I was late by 15 minutes as I had not been feeling well for the past two-three days. I had stopped at a stall for tea when people came running out of the lane, screaming about an earthquake. Soon, more people came and said our factory had collapsed. I rushed to check on my mother and called out her name, but she did not respond. There was dust all around and nothing was visible,” said Rizwan, who is from Shahjahanpur in Uttar Pradesh.

Rizwan is among the seven who worked on the mezzanine floor of the motor stamping factory in RZ-block of Vishnu Garden where the mishap took place around 9.30am on Saturday. Four people were killed while two were injured – one critically – in the mishap. Rizwan’s 45-year-old mother Guddi (single name) was among the four dead. The other three deceased were identified as China Devi, 36, Twinkle, 25, and Ramesh, 35. The two injured are Ravi, 20, and Guddu Kumar, 18.

According to Rizwan, when the roof of a loft constructed on the ground floor, by laying red stones upon iron angles, collapsed and fell on the six people working inside, nearly a dozen workers who were working on the first floor of the building rushed out, puzzled as to what had happened and what to do next.

“It took us two-three minutes to understand that the loft’s roof had collapsed and the raw as well as manufactured iron materials kept in the nearly 100 plastic sacks and stored on the roof had fallen on my mother and five other workers. Some locals joined us in the rescue operation. It took us almost half an hour to rescue my mother and the other trapped workers, despite 20 of us working together,” said Rizwan, adding that the left side of his mother’s face was totally crushed.

Guddi lived with her husband, Mumtaz Shah, son Rizwan, his wife and three children in a rented home in Khyala, nearly half a kilometre away from the factory, where she had been working there for the past nine years.

Waiting for his wife’s body at Deen Dayal Upadhyay Hospital mortuary after autopsy, Mumtaz said his family had migrated to Delhi in search of livelihood.

“Despite factories being closed during the lockdown, we stayed in Delhi and survived the entire lockdown on free meals distributed in our neighbourhood. We belong to a poor family and there is no work back home. But after losing my wife, I am considering returning to my village,” said Mumtaz.