Deadly string strikes again: Man seriously injured

The incident has once again exposed the administration’s failure in enforcing the National Green Tribunal’s ban on the Chinese manjha.

For past three days, a 48-year-old motor mechanic is bed ridden, trying to recover from the severe injuries he sustained when banned Chinese ‘manjha’ (synthetic kite thread coated with glass ) slit his throat in Thakurganj on Thursday afternoon.

The cut was so deep that the doctors said the injury would have claimed his life had he not been given timely treatment. (AFP File Photo / Representative image)

The incident has once again exposed the administration’s failure in enforcing the National Green Tribunal’s ban on the dangerous string since 2016.

The incident occurred when the victim, Saadatganj resident Syed Ghulam Hur alias Rana was going with his brother Ashraf to greet his friend on Eid at around 2.30 pm. His nephew Imran said the string got stuck in his head and slipped to his neck while he was driving a motorcycle near Bhuwar pull on Thakurganj’s ring road. Imran said the string slit the throat of his uncle very deep before he could stop the motorcycle to remove it.

The cut was so deep that the doctors said the injury would have claimed his life had he not been given timely treatment. He said his uncle remained admitted to a private hospital in Chowk for around 24 hours. Now he has been discharged and is trying to recover. He said the family had not lodged any complaint with the police in the matter.

Additional SP West Vikas Chandra Tripathi said,” Police are aware of the incident but no FIR has been lodged. However we are planning to carry out a drive to check the sale of banned kite string and take action.”

Notably, the synthetic string has already proved to be hazardous to birds as well as humans in the past. In Lucknow, which is known for kite flying, many incidents were reported in recent years, where the banned string was blamed for injuring or proving fatal to birds.

Moreover, the string has caused major inconvenience in functioning of metro train in the past when its power supply tripped after the string touched over head wires. The metro staff had to clear a large quantity of string from the train’s over head wires to resume its operation. Besides, staff was deputed to clear the strings from the overhead electricity track regularly.