Five family members killed after boulder falls on their home in Thane following heavy rains

Mangalore Today News Network

Thane, Jul 20, 2021: Five members of a family were killed on Monday after a boulder rolled down and crashed on their home due to incessant rains in Thane city, while seven people were feared drowned at separate places in Maharashtra as Mumbai reeled under downpour for the second day, leading to water-logging and disruption in local train services, officials said.

 

The India Meteorological Department (IMD) sounded a ’red alert’ for Mumbai and other districts in the Konkan region, predicting extremely heavy rainfall at isolated places over the next 24 hours.

Mumbai and its neighbouring districts of Thane, Palghar and Raigad have been witnessing heavy rains since the last couple of days.

 

The torrential rains over the weekend claimed 30 lives in the metropolis.
Thane Municipal Corporation’s Regional Disaster Management Cell chief Santosh Kadam said the boulder incident took place in the evening in Gholai Nagar, where five people - a husband-wife duo and their three minor children - were buried alive.

The bodies were retrieved from the debris by search and rescue personnel, he said.

"Two children were rescued after the incident. All the deceased, including three minors, were from the same family," he said.

Kadam said the boulder crashed on a house in a ’chawl’ (an old row tenement), trapping its seven occupants, all from the same family.

While two children (siblings), aged 5 and 18, were rescued, the five others died in the incident, he said.

The deceased were identified as Prabhu Sudam Yadav (45), his wife Vidhavatidevi Yadav (40) and their children Ravikisan (12) Simaran (10) and Sandhya (3), Kadam said.

People have been shifted from the houses in the vicinity as a precautionary measure, he added.

State Urban Development Minister Eknath Shinde, who is also the Thane Guardian Minister, visited the site of the boulder crash and later announced a compensation of Rs 5 lakh to each of the deceased.

The minister also visited the civic hospital where the two injured siblings are admitted and enquired about their condition. He directed the civic body to immediately relocate those staying in dangerous hutments to safer places.

Calling the incident unfortunate, BJP Thane city and district president and MLC Niranjan Davkhare, who also visited the site and later the hospital, said there were rampant unauthorised constructions in hillocks in Kalwa.

Courtesy:India Today