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Amit Yadav, a 17-year-old BA student, packed his lunch and went with his cousins and friends to help them repair a drain at Noida’s Jalvayu Vihar residential society. According to his family, he wasn’t supposed to be there.
Yadav, who died alongside three others when the boundary wall of the society collapsed, wanted to join the Indian Army and was preparing for the physical test. But it was his “helping nature” that landed him in trouble.
The labourers were hired by a private contractor and were known to each other as most hailed from Budaun in UP. The men were buried under rubble around 9.30 am, when a 120-feet stretch of the wall collapsed. Fire tenders, JCBs, police, Noida Authority officials, residents and locals rushed to help the men.
Over the next hour, 13 men were pulled out and sent to the nearest hospital. Four died due to severe head and chest injuries. They were identified as Amit Yadav (17), Dharamveer (17), Pushpender Singh (25) and Paan Singh (25).
For Yadav and Dharamveer, both minors, it was their first day at the site. The latter had been bogged down by family responsibilities after his father met with an accident and stopped working.
Vinod, Yadav’s uncle, who was also at the site, said, “He came yesterday and wanted to travel. We thought he could work and earn for his family. He has three sisters and two younger brothers. He told us he took admission at a college in Budaun this week and was preparing for the Army recruitment test. He was an ambitious kid. I feel bad because I asked him to work. His father doesn’t earn much and had trusted us. I failed him. What will I tell his mother? She loved her son. He was smart, athletic and sweet natured. When I asked him to accompany me, he readily accepted the offer.”
Yadav did his schooling from Badaun and was planning to shift to Delhi. His father is a farmer and mother a homemaker. The family said he and Paan Singh are cousins. The latter had been working with this particular contractor for a few years and had called his cousins and friends to work alongside him in Noida.
Dharmveer’s family in Badaun was devastated when his elder brother, Rishi Pal (20), called them to break the news of his death. “I can never forget. He was standing hardly 10 metres away from me and I couldn’t save him.
All I remember is the wall collapsing on us and a cloud of dust. Dharam got trapped. I tried pulling him out but it wasn’t easy. The rubble was heavy. Officials got JCBs to remove the rubble. I was praying for my brother’s safety but when I saw his body… it was all over. I didn’t want Dharam to work. He had left school to help our family but I wanted him to follow his dreams. He wanted to shift to the city. My father got into a road accident two years back and severely injured his left leg. He had to quit his job and my brother and I had to take up odd jobs to support our family,” said Rishi.
Rishi called his parents around 10.30-11 am and told them about the death. They didn’t respond and cut the call. Later, he received a message from his uncle saying all of them had left for Noida.
The men were being paid around Rs 300–500 per day. None of them were provided with helmets or any other safety equipment, relatives said.
At the district hospital, Pushpender’s cousins went looking for his body after the collapse. “It all happened so fast… I was clueless. We saw his body lying at the mortuary and were shocked. He was the sole earner in his family and has four children. The eldest child is not even 15. He had come back to Noida four-five days ago after visiting his family in Badaun. The kids don’t even know about their father’s death. We want action against the contractor. How could he push people to work when the wall was already inclined? My brother died over Rs 500…” said Sarvender.
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