Mumbai: BMC shifts blame onto grieving family for fatal toilet tragedy

Ramlagan’s daughter Sunita (centre), flanked by a neighbour and her younger brother, comforts her mother at the deceased’s residence in Malwani, Malad. File pic

On March 21, at the BMC community toilet in Malad's Ambujwadi, three members of a family died while cleaning a water tank contaminated with faecal leakage from an adjoining septic tank. One month later, BMC's P North ward officials prepared a report confirming this but attributed the tragedy to the family's "wrongdoings."

Assistant Commissioner Kiran Dighavkar stated that the report, prepared by the executive engineer, had been submitted to the ward's deputy commissioner. While the officials have not released the report to the press, Dighavkar said, "We have found that they had punctured the water tank to increase the capacity of the septic tank to avoid cleaning it frequently, which was their wrongdoing as that amounts to structural damage."

When asked for further explanation for this theory of wanting an additional septic tank, as BMC provides free desludging services to community-based organisation (CBO) toilets, he said, "He may have not wanted to call someone frequently to clean the toilet as until desludging finishes, the toilet needs to be kept shut." Desludging work can last for a few hours or more, depending on factors like the size of the tank, volume of waste, and quality of equipment used by the civic body.

The family of the deceased 45-year-old Ramlagan Kevat and his two sons, Suraj, 18, and Bikas, 20, earlier told mid-day that BMC had never sent staff to desludge the septic tank. Instead, they alleged that the staff had asked for Rs 5,000 to provide the desludging services. Dighavkar dismissed this as a baseless claim.

Since its inception in 2017, the toilet where the deaths occurred has had three tanks. Two were underground tanks: one for waste and the other for borehole water. The borehole water was earlier pumped onto the rooftop tank using a motor. For the past couple of years, the CBO Om Jai Durga Seva Society, tasked with managing the toilet, had directed the supply to the overhead tank through a separate pipe as the motor incurred frequent repair costs.

The deceased Ramlagan was a secretary of this CBO. Confirming mid-day's earlier reporting on the matter, Dighavkar said, "They had managed to bring in a new water connection, which is why he wanted to clean that underground water tank which was not in use." However, he added, "He (Ramlagan) thought he would repair the puncture he made earlier and turn it into a usable water tank again."

Another CBO member, Sunil Mishra, denied this. He said, "As they were pulled out from the water tank by the locals, we have been maintaining from the start that there was a leakage somewhere because of which waste was transferred to the water tank. Now that the BMC is also saying the same, we are convinced that the leak has been there since the toilet was constructed, which makes it BMC's responsibility."

He added, "Locals here or Ramlagan had no reason to puncture the tank." Meanwhile, Chimaji Adhav, senior inspector at Malwani police station, said the investigation is still ongoing as far as they are concerned. "We have not received any report from the BMC," he said.

From the day of the incident until March 26, when BMC ordered an inquiry into the matter after an FIR was filed against P North officials by the family for negligence, there was a contradiction between the BMC ward officials and the Malwani police. The former kept insisting it was a septic tank into which the residents fell, while the police stated it was a water tank containing waste.