Construction of New foot over bridge starts in Elphinstone Road station

Mumbai, November 23: The Indian Army has begun construction of a foot over bridge at the Elphinstone Road Railway Station in Mumbai, almost two months after a rush left 23 people dead. To let Army work on schedule, the Western Railway will also resort mega blocks during the night, other than Sundays.

 

Railway minister Piyush Goyal, defence minister Nirmala Sitharaman, and Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis visited the Elphinstone Road station on October 31 after the month of the incident. It was announced that the army will help build three new foot-over-bridges at the Elphinstone Road station. The construction is supposed to be completed by January 31.

Sitharaman had said that it was probably the “first time that the Army will come in to build in what could otherwise be called civil work” to avoid recurrence of the unfortunate accident in the city, which gives jobs to millions.

A stampede broke out at the sub-urban at Elphinstone road station in Mumbai. At least 23 people were killed and 39 others were injured in the stampede. The incident took place between the Parel railway station and Elphinstone road railway station. The incident occurred during the morning rush hour at Elphinstone road station, when four trains arrived simultaneously at the station. It was further raining at the time and there were already numerous people crammed into the narrow bridge. When the rain stopped, people started stepping out, and a pedestrian is believed to have slipped, which resulted in a chaos. The stampede was triggered by a rumor that the pedestrian bridge was collapsing which sparked chaos among passengers as they surged forwards to flee.