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A Village Burnt Overnight: Tears, Loss and Survival in Dhamangaon Blaze

  Sitting amid the blackened remains of his home, 32-year-old Nikesh Gawali carefully broke open a half-melted plastic box with a screwdriver. His hands shook slightly, not out of fear, but out of hope. “I’m trying to find my daughter Aarti’s gold earrings,” he said quietly, still focused on the box. “She’s just five. I got them made recently after months of labour work.” The plastic box, warped and blackened by heat, was one of the few things left from his two-room house on the outskirts of Dhamangaon village . All around him lay ash, broken tin sheets and charred wooden beams. The walls had cracked under the heat and the front room’s tin roof had caved in completely. What remained was a blackened debris all around - almost nothing to suggest a home once stood there. Nikesh earns his living as an agricultural labourer, like many in the village. Work is uncertain and depends on the season. Those earrings weren’t just jewellery - they were a small dream, a reward for his hard work,...

Car turns turtle in overtaking bid, leaves four injured at Mate square


Four youngsters sustained injuries as speeding car they were travelling in hit road-divider, took a 10-feet high jump into air, and turned turtle when overtaking bid by car driver went wrong near Mate Square on Saturday late night. The injured youngsters fled the spot leaving the damaged car behind.


According to eye-witnesses, a Hyundai i-20 car (MH-40/KR-9002) was coming from Rana Pratap Nagar Square with speed exceeding 100 km/hr. The driver tried to overtake an Indica car. The driver tried to over-take Indica through a small gap between road-divider and Indica. However, during the risky move, the driver lost balance and hit road-divider. In panic, driver applied brakes immediately. As a result, the i-20 car jumped 10-feet high into air, turned turtle, and skid before coming to a stop at a distance of 50-feet from the spot where it had hit road-divider.


Soon, residents of the area gathered at the spot. “We heard a loud bang,” said a resident. There were four youths in the car that turned turtle. Everyone was injured but one of them sustained serious injuries in the mishap. However, all of them fled the spot after mishap, a resident added. Staff of Rana Pratap Nagar police station arrived at the spot. 

The police said that the car was owned by Mamtaz Siddiqui, a resident of Kamptee. Following the accident, a large number of onlookers gathered at the spot and traffic between Mate Square and Rana Pratap Nagar Square was thrown out of gear for some time. Till filing of the report, the cops were busy recording statements of eye-witnesses. 

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