Tampered equipment may have led to mishap

Tampering of equipment by workers may have resulted in the accident at the monorail construction site in Chembur on July 1. HT reports.

Tampering of equipment by workers may have resulted in the accident at the monorail construction site in Chembur on July 1.

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“We are not ruling out the possibility of some of the labourers tampering with the equipment,” metropolitan commissioner Rahul Asthana said.

Asthana said they were still awaiting the final report on the accident.

Two workers were killed and three others were injured when a 60-tonne beam being installed at Jijamata Nagar near Rashtriya Chemical Factory crashed as the crane holding the clamp slipped.

Three separate inquires were set up to look into the accident. Larsen & Toubro (L&T), which is undertaking the civil work, was asked to conduct a separate inquiry.

The consultants of the project, Louis Berger, were also asked to investigate the matter, while the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) appointed a committee of independent experts to look into the accident.

The MMRDA is now waiting for the final report to determine the exact cause of the accident.

“We will be sending a formal proposal to the central ministry of labour for getting these safety audits done,” Asthana said, adding that the MMRDA had already spoken informally to the director of industrial safety for the same.

Since 2008, eight people — construction workers and civilians — have lost their lives due to mishaps at construction sites of big-ticket infrastructure projects.

The state government has taken a serious note of these accidents and plans to undertake a drive to check safety standards on major projects. Nearly 6,500 people work on various infrastructure projects across the city.