Delay in moving India Gate accident victim to hospital led to his death, alleges wife | Latest News Delhi - Hindustan Times
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Delay in moving India Gate accident victim to hospital led to his death, alleges wife

Hindustan Times, New Delhi | ByAnvit Srivastava, New Delhi
Sep 04, 2019 06:51 AM IST

Senior officers, however, refuted the allegations and claimed that all the injured were taken to the hospital without any delay.

It took Poonam Diwan some time to realise that her husband Kewal Diwan had pushed her and their three-year-old daughter Myra out of a speeding dumper truck’s path.

The mangled remains of an auto-rickshaw and the Diwans’ scooter after a dumper truck ran over them Monday night.(Arvind Yadav/HT PHOTO)
The mangled remains of an auto-rickshaw and the Diwans’ scooter after a dumper truck ran over them Monday night.(Arvind Yadav/HT PHOTO)

“Last I remember is seeing my husband pushing me away while I was buying ice-cream from a vendor on the footpath along the India Gate lawns. When I turned back, I couldn’t see my husband or my daughter Manya. People were screaming and some vehicles had been crushed,” Poonam said, recalling the accident that claimed her husband and eight-year-old daughter’s life at Rajpath on Monday night.

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“Since Myra had fallen, I picked her up and saw she had scratches on her hands. I then looked around and saw Kewal and Manya lying under the truck. My daughter’s face was buried in the mud. I rushed towards her, picked her up and cried for help. With the help of locals, my daughter was rushed to a hospital, but my husband was left lying under the rear of the truck,” Poonam added.

She said that with the help of a passerby, she called her brother Sahil Arora and informed her family about the accident. Poonam alleged that until Sahil and the rest of their family reached the spot from their house close to Tilak Nagar in west Delhi, her husband lay on the road. “It was only after I had reached the spot that my brother-in-law’s body was moved to a hospital. It is possible the delay led to his death. This is sheer negligence,” Sahil alleged.

Rajinder Kumar, Kewal’s uncle, who also rushed to the spot, appealed to senior police officers to check CCTV camera footage of the spot and urged them to take disciplinary action against the policemen who delayed rushing Kewal to hospital.

Senior officers, however, refuted the allegations and claimed that all the injured were taken to the hospital without any delay. “We got the call around 12.20am. There was no delay in taking the injured or deceased to the hospital. Hospital records can be checked,” additional deputy commissioner of police (New Delhi) Deepak Yadav said.

Yadav said a medical examination of the driver was also conducted and his reports are awaited to ascertain if he was drunk at the time of the accident. “We have CCTV camera footage of the accident and the incident is being probed from all possible angles,” the officer said.

Kewal was the only earning member of the family and lived with his elderly father, wife and two daughters at their Kailash Nagar house in east Delhi’s Gandhi Nagar.

Poonam’s cousin Sanjay Sindhani said the Diwans had bought a new scooter about two weeks ago. “Since Monday was a holiday at Manya’s school and she got done with her exams the day before, Kewal took his wife and daughters on an outing. We had no idea the picnic would turn tragic,” he said.

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