Three pedestrians electrocuted on flooded stretch near Iffco Chowk

Three pedestrians navigating a waterlogged August Kranti Marg near the Iffco Chowk Metro station were electrocuted on Wednesday night after a tree got uprooted and snapped a power supply cable following heavy rainfall in the area, Gurugram police officers said on Thursday.
The victims were identified as Devesh Bajpai, 34, Jaipal Yadav, 32, and Wasiuzzama Siddiqui, 55. Officers said the incident occurred between 8pm and 9pm, but they received information about the same at 9.45pm.
Inspector Ravi Kumar, station house officer of the DLF police station in Sector 29, said some commuters spotted bodies in the waterlogged street and alerted the control room.
“We reached the spot to find an uprooted tree, along with a broken power cable lying in the water,” he said.
“A team of Dakshin Haryana Bijli Vitran Nigam (DHBVN) reached the spot after snapping the power supply to the entire area, after which the bodies were removed,” the inspector said, adding that they are conducting an inquiry under Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS) section 194 on the basis of separate complaints received from the families of the deceased.
Meanwhile, DHBVN superintendent engineer (circle-II) PK Chauhan said the broken end of a live wire powering street lights had fallen into the water accumulated from the heavy rainfall, which led to the deaths.
The bodies of all three deceased were handed over to the families after an autopsy on Thursday.
Families say left in the dark
Police said Bajpai worked as an operator in a telecom equipment manufacturing firm at IMT Manesar, and was at Iffco Chowk to catch the Metro to New Delhi railway station, from where he was to go to his hometown of Unnao in Uttar Pradesh. Siddiqui too worked in IMT Manesar and wanted to catch the Metro to his house in Sangam Vihar in Delhi, while Yadav, a driver with a logistics firm in Platinum Towers, was waiting for a bus to his accommodation at Wazirabad, Sector 52, officers said.
Yadav’s brother-in-law Krishan Singh Yadav alleged that his family was kept in the dark about the death for many hours.
“Police alerted us about his death at about 2.30am while the incident had taken place several hours back,” the brother-in-law said.
Mohammad Sayeed, a relative of Siddiqui, said police contacted them only at around 4am.
“Siddiqui used to return home by 9.30pm. However, when he failed to reach home till late on Wednesday, we tried to contact him, but his phone was unreachable. It was finally at 4am on Thursday that the ring went through, and a policeman picked up the call to inform us about his death,” he said.
Meanwhile, Bajpai’s brother Yogesh alleged that the negligence of discom officials led to the deaths.
“They should have pruned branches or removed the tree from vulnerable areas, like they do every year. We want action against the erring officials,” he said.
DHBVN’s Chauhan however said that the discom had no role in the incident.
“DHBVN has no role in the incident as it was a 230 volts power supply of MCG for street lights. Even then, our officials along with a MCG team immediately reached the spot to carry out a rescue operation after switching off power supply to the area,” Chauhan said.