Railways give Rs 5 lakh to kin of those killed in Pune hoarding collapse

PUNE: Central Railway Saturday informed that it had given compensation of Rs 5 lakh each to the next of kin of the deceased in Friday's hoarding collapse incident.

A 40-feet hoarding Friday collapsed on vehicles which had halted at Shahir Amar Shaikh Chowk traffic light near Pune Railway Station, killing four people and injuring five others.

The hoarding was being dismantled at around 2 pm by a contractor hired by the railways when it came crashing down.

Two railway employees -- junior engineer Sanjay Singh and his assistant Pandurang Wanare, were produced before a court here Saturday and remanded in police custody till October 11.

"We have paid compensation of Rs 5 lakh each to the next of kin of Shamrao Kasar (70), Shamrao Dhotre (48), Shivaji Pardeshi (40) and Javed Khan (40)," said Divisional Railway Manager Milind Deouskar in a press conference.

"We have given Rs 1 lakh to those who are grievously injured while people with simple injuries have been given Rs 50,000," he added.

He also said that all the medical expenses of the injured would be borne by the railways.

He claimed that the contractor, who was given the job to dismantle the structure, had successfully removed four other hoarding metal frames.

"It seems that he had not followed the procedure this time while removing the metal frame that came crashing down and claimed four lives and injured five others," he said.

He added that a high level committee is investigating the incident and it is expected to submit its report in 15 days.

Central Railway officials said that the railways, in January this year, had told the advertisement agency to stop putting up hoardings at the site after the latter failed to submit the structural audit report of the hoarding frames.

"Though the present structures were strong and legal, as the agency did not furnish the structural report, we took a conscious decision to dismantle the hoardings and had started the work," he added.