Rajkumar Mehta, father of Yuvraj Mehta who drowned in water-filled pit in Greater Noida, said that had necessary support been extended in time, his son would have survived.
The father of 27-year-old software engineer Yuvraj Mehta, who died after his car plunged into a water-filled pit in Sector 150 of Greater Noida, has alleged that his son remained alive for nearly two hours, crying for help, while most people at the spot “were just watching and making videos”.
Recalling the harrowing moments, Rajkumar Mehta said his son repeatedly called him from inside the pit, pleading for help.
“My son was struggling to save himself. He kept repeating ‘papa bachao, papa bachao’ every time we spoke on the phone. He was also shouting ‘help, help’ so that general public might hear his cry for help, but most of the crowd was just watching. Some people were making videos,” he told news agency ANI.
According to Mehta, the accident took place around midnight. “The incident took place around 12 am, and around 2.30, signal stopped coming from my son’s end,” he said, adding that his son fought for his life for nearly two hours. “My son struggled for 2 hours to save his life. Had he been given little support, he might have survived.”
Mehta said his son had informed him that he had fallen into a drain and shared his location. “I reached the spot immediately. The visibility was very poor there. I asked my son for his exact location and he turned on the torch on his phone. You could see the dim light even in poor visibility. He had drifted quite a distance,” he said.
He alleged that no proper rescue effort was made during the crucial window. “If any divers had attempted to save him using a rope, he might have survived,” Mehta said, claiming that those present were ill-equipped.
“The officials and staff present there were not capable of saving him. They did not have any divers. They did not have any boat. There is negligence by the administration in this entire matter,” he told ANI.
As per police, Yuvraj Mehta, a resident of Tata Eureka Park society in Sector 150, was returning home from work in Gurugram when his car went out of control amid fog and fell into an over 20-feet-deep pit dug for the basement of an under-construction building. Police received information around 12.15 am and a search operation was launched. His body was recovered later on Saturday morning with the help of teams from the fire department, the State Disaster Response Force, the National Disaster Response Force and local police.
An FIR has been registered against two real estate developers based on a complaint by the victim’s family. In the complaint, Mehta alleged that residents had repeatedly requested the Noida Authority to install barricading and reflectors at the accident-prone site, but no action was taken.
Eyewitnesses, including a delivery agent, have also alleged that rescue efforts were delayed and claimed that Mehta was seen standing on the roof of his car, using his mobile phone’s torch to signal for help.
