Mumbai: The BMC general assembly was adjourned on Saturday after corporators across party lines attacked the civic administration for the death of a person in Dadar due to a falling tree. Corporators criticised the administration for not reacting to several tree-fall deaths last year and this year as well.
Around 3.30 p.m. on Thursday, Dinesh Sangle, 38, was walking down a street in Dadar when a gulmohar tree growing on the compound of the Mumbai Marathi Granth Sanghralaya fell on him. The Parel resident was taken to KEM Hospital, where doctors declared him ‘dead on arrival’. It took the police several hours to determine his identity, as he only had a credit card on him.
The BMC had issued a notice to the library’s management on April 6 under section 383 of the MMC Act, directing it to trim the tree. The library management claims to have written to the civic body nearly a year ago in August 2017, requesting it to trim the tree. Congress corporator and Leader of Opposition Ravi Raja moved a point of order in the general assembly on Saturday, condemning the incident. “Nobody should have to die on their way to work or home. This is not acceptable,” he said.
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Corporators from the Shiv Sena, BJP and SP condemned the incident and demanded an inquiry. The Sena’s Vishakha Raut, who is Leader of the House, said, “The administration should compensate the victim’s kin on humanitarian grounds. There should be an inquiry to fix responsibility for trimming the tree. The library management had written to BMC in August, asking it to trim the tree, but the BMC put the onus on them.”