September 9th - 9:03 PM.
Its finally stopped raining after almost 2 hours. The lights have just come back, the cable is still down, only just connected to internet. Went out to grab some groceries, when my HR guy calls me and tells me that a part of the Panjagutta flyover (an in progress project, to link Begumpet and Jubilee Hills) had collapsed, killing at least 15 people. Unacceptable but again the life will move on without anybody being held responsible for such a tragedy.
The ambitious flyover is an 11 km project and had now been under construction for almost an year. The project had not even been completed yet. Seemingly weak stilts & heavy rainfall were the reasons for the collapse.
When recently a bridge collapsed in US on August 2nd, killing 7 people it became a national tragedy. I hope again we do not continue our knee jerk reaction and forget about this incident before finding out the exactly what & who were responsible for this glaring failure.
Most of our guys have checked in to say they are all fine, which is a relief.
Tragedy comes in twos - first the twin blasts in Hyderabad, where one of the blast sites was about 4-5 KMs from our apartments and now flyover collapse a section of which is barely about 700 meters from our apartments.
Godspeed Hyderabadis!
And we want ANSWERS.
***Update September 10th - 01:10 AM***
The cable is still down most probably because my cable provider’s office is in Panjagutta and some lines may have been effected due to the collapse, thats the only explainable reason. However, was able to see the story on IBN Live. The death toll mounts to 30. This is really turning out to be worse than I had expected. Trying to catch news on NDTV 24×7 but there is a big discussion going on over being overweight.
***Updates 11:25 AM***
The death toll has been lowered to two now, three by some accounts.
***Updates 03:40 PM***
Andhra Pradesh Government has filed a case against the Gammon Constructions India and suspended 3 government officials. It has setup an inquiry which has been asked to submit a report in 3 days. They have been quick to act against the private company and the administrative, what they have not addressed up to now is what of the gross administrative neglect and failure of its ranks and files. Would we see a politician taking blame? I think not! In India, the polity is virtually never wrong, its only failure all around them.
The casualty reports are now at 4 dead and 10 injured. Government has announced a 5 Lac compensation for those dead and 20 K for the injured.
![Geetanjali Nagpal - targetted by crass journalism [Image from TOI]](http://creepsterinc.files.wordpress.com/2007/09/nagpal.jpg?w=164&h=204)
Just witnessed the main story running on Star News channel. A former model Geetanjali Nagpal reduced to begging on the streets of Delhi allegedly owing to her drug habits. The news does warrant a look and does indeed need to be brought to notice of masses for social awareness and drug abuse stories but splashing as the main story is taking it too far. Further still, if you were to see the way the lady was made to look like an item on show by the channel, you couldn’t help wondering how insensitive the reporting has become. And when you hear how Star News was first on scene to contact the model, how Star News tried helping the model and how the model was *taken* in a STAR NEWS car to different places - it enrages your senses thinking “all this for creating a news story”. For media the charity obviously begins on the public address system. I don’t think they ever heard the saying that goes “Do good and forget it”.
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