MALL TOLL

MALL TOLL
The absence of fool-proof safety measures in city malls is once again in the spotlight following the death of a young man from a fall at Forum Mall last week
PRAVEEN KUMAR


Two years ago, there was a hue and cry about the paucity of safety measures in high-rise buildings after a young boy fell to his death from the fourth floor of a well-known city mall. The police had issued strict safety instructions to all such mega outlets, especially with regard to safety nets, but it seems no lessons have been learnt as yet. In a chilling replay of the earlier incident, a young man slipped and fell to his death from the third floor of Forum Mall in the Audugodi police limits recently. The bereaved parents have blamed their son’s death on the absence of a safety net at the ground-floor level of the mall.
The victim has been identified as Mujeeb Ahmed (25), a resident of Banashankari, who is related to a top-ranking police officer in the city. Mujeeb, who was married a month ago, was an employee of a private telecom company located opposite Forum Mall. He had gone to the PVR theatre in the mall with a woman colleague to watch the last show of a movie.
His father Alla Baksh told Bangalore Mirror that according to the police, Mujeeb slipped and fell from the third floor of the mall during the intermission of the movie. “A woman, who identified herself as my son’s colleague, telephoned me and said my son had accidentally fallen from the third floor in the centre of the mall,” Baksh said. “After I rushed to the hospital with my relatives, we found him still alive. My son asked us to remove a cloth which was tied around his waist by the Forum Mall personnel, as it was causing him discomfort. Later, as his condition was critical, he was taken into the ICU and he died in the wee hours,” he said.
“The woman colleague who had accompanied my son to the movie and who telephoned me was later taken away by the police for questioning to ascertain the exact cause of the death. In the initial stages, it was not clear how my son fell from the third floor. I sought the help of my relative, Wazeer Ahmed, a DIG in the Department of Fire and Emergency Services, to help me know the exact cause of the fall. We then came to know that Mujeeb had an accidental fall from the third floor of the mall. If the mall had fixed a safety net on the ground floor, my son would still be alive,” said Baksh.
According to an eyewitness to the incident who wished to remain anonymous, Mujeeb, after falling from the third floor, crashed on to the glass barricade on the second floor, causing the glass to break and leaving a marked dent on the adjoining ledge. After hitting the second floor barricade, he fell to the ground floor. According to the witness, the height from the third floor to the ground floor is around 50 feet.
The security personnel of the mall shifted an unconscious Mujeeb, who had sustained severe head injuries and was bleeding profusely, in an autorickshaw to the nearby St John’s Hospital, where he died. The house-keeping staff of the mall removed the bloodstains, which they should not have done till the police had conducted the spot ‘mahazar’. According to the witness, the bloodstains were removed and everything was back to normal within minutes of the incident.
Another source said the mall management seemed more concerned about the aesthetics of the place —- some artificial palm trees are kept in the centre — than putting up a safety net at the ground level.
According to the Audugodi police who have registered a case of unnatural death, the incident was brought to their notice by the St John’s Hospital staff. The hospital informed the police that it was a medico-legal case involving a fall. Subsequent investigations showed that Mujeeb died after accidentally falling from the third floor of the mall, the police said.
BOY’S TRAGIC END
On July 1, 2007, six-year-old Aahan Bhandari died after an accidental fall from the fourth floor of Garuda Mall in the Ashoknagar police limits.Aahan, who had gone with his parents to watch a movie in the Inox multiplex, fell when he tried to climb the parapet railing on the fourth floor. The boy, who was rushed to a nearby private hospital, remained unconscious for around two hours before he breathed his last.