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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,...

Boom lift at Metro site crushes beggar to death

A truck-mounted boom lift engaged for MahaMetro work crushed a beggar to death near Santra Market on Wednesday night. The accident occured when the operator of the machine was parking it on the road side, said police officials.
According to police, the truck-mounted boom lift was tasked for painting the metro tracks. The operator reversed the machine and moved ahead at 7.30 pm. Due to the negligent driving of the operator, the man who was sleeping on the roadside came under the wheels of the machine. He died instantaneously on the spot as he was crushed under the large wheels of the truck.
A large number of onlookers gathered at the spot following the accident. Staff of Ganeshpeth police station rushed to the spot and sent the body for post-mortem after performing panchanama. “The man looked like a beggar who was sleeping on the road side. We have not found any documents from his pocket which could help to identify him,” the police official said. The operator managed to flee the spot after the accident. A case will be registered against the operator for causing death due to negligence, the police official said.
The MahaMetro has given a contract of painting to ITD company which further gave a sub-contract to Universal company, said a Metro official. Three such man lifter machines are brought in Nagpur for painting work by the company with its operators.
It may be mentioned that people are panicked due to the two major such accidents caused by boom lifts within just 10-days. On May 22, a truck mounted boom lift collapsed on Central Avenue damaging many shops. The boom lift was stationed near the square for painting Metro’s tracks. The machine suddenly disbalanced and the boom of the work platform collapsed crashing into the structures of roadside shops. No casualty was reported as there was no movement of vehicles.


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