Photo by BL SONI Mumbai: “Mera phool gir gaya” (My flowers fell)! These were the harmless words uttered by a man carrying a flower basket on the Elphinstone overbridge that became a sinister “Pool gir gaya” (the bridge has collapsed) in the echo chamber of the commuters that led to a horrific stampede which claimed the lives of at least 22 people.These details were shared by 19-year-old Shilpa Vishwakarma, who is a survivor of the tragedy.
Vishwakarma had left home to reach Elphinstone road station and was heading to Vile Parle to attend her engineering classes. “The station is hardly ten minutes away from my residence. I had left home at 9:55 am; it suddenly started raining and commuters rushed to take cover at under the bridge. A huge crowd had gathered by the time I reached the exit point,” said Vishwakarma.
She, too, waited near the bridge for the crowd to disperse. “After a few minutes, the crowd began to disperse and I started climbing the bridge. I had reached halfway when the crowd started swelling yet again and I saw at least four men carrying sacks containing flowers,” added Vishwakarma.
Suddenly, one of the men carrying the flower sack tripped on the wet stairs and then everybody around him was falling head over heels like a pack of cards. “People who had misheard the words of the flower seller began to panic and jostled with others to reach the top of the overbridge. At least four people were hovering over me and I was desperately trying to catch up with my breath,” said Vishwakarma.
Her eyes filled with tears as she recounted the incident. “I fell flat on my stomach and was lying on top of a woman. There were another four lying on the heap that was us. We were unable to move our limbs and lay still in the open space between two sections of the staircase. It was only my will power which helped me survive,” she said. “A victim of the stampede, who was later identified as Tilakram Teli (45), sacrificed his life to help me. He was lying on the top and breathing heavily. My hands were dangling in the air; he evicted me from the heap, pushing me downstairs after he realised that I was injured,” recalls Vishwakarma.
It was her good fortune that she landed on the third last stair at the exit of the bridge. “I couldn’t realize what was happening. But in no time, two more persons tumbled over and I was sandwiched between them. A local volunteer, who spotted me, pulled my hand and extricated me from the heap,” recounts the survivor. She has minor injuries on her hands and legs and is getting treated by her family doctor.
Vishwakarma has a humble family background and aspires to become an engineer. The brave 19-year-old said that one must have the will power to tackle all difficult situations in life.
