Kolkata: On grihapravesh day, 9-year-old girl falls through 90-ft fire shaft, lands in hospital

KOLKATA: A nine-year-old girl is battling for life at a city hospital after falling 90 feet through a fire hydrant shaft of a highrise in Maheshtala while her parents were busy with grihapravesh rituals in their new ninth-floor apartment on Thursday night.
Anwesha Ghosh is on ventilation after suffering brain haemorrhage and her condition is so critical that even a surgical intervention isn't possible till her vitals stabilise, say doctors.
The fire hydrant shaft - hidden behind a latched glass-and-grille door and located in the corridor outside the new flat at Eden City complex - had loosely glued PVC sheets covering the hollow. Answesha and her friend stepped on to the sheet while playing, possibly mistaking it for a concrete floor. Unable to bear the girl's weight, the sheet gave way, plunging her through the shaft. As she fell, she ripped through eight layers of PVC sheets, each of them slightly breaking the fall but unable to stop it completely. She finally landed on the concrete floor at the ground level on a heap of broken PVC panels.
Doctors treating Anwesha feel the arrested fall is why she is still fighting for life. Her friend had a providential escape after managing to hang on to the edge before being rescued by a relative.
"The family was busy with grihapravesh rituals and attending on guests. The two girls had stepped out of the flat and were playing in the corridor. They appear to have opened the shaft door out of curiosity and stepped inside probably thinking it was a closet," said Sarika Gon, a neighbour.
After she fell through a 90-foot fire shaft adjacent to her new home on the 9th floor of Eden City Maheshtala, Anwesha’s father, Gautam Ghosh, a government employee, and other residents first took her to two local nursing homes and then to CMRI Hospital around 13 km away.
“We are all praying that she pulls through,” said Athar Khan, a neighbour who did the rounds of hospital with the family on Thursday night. Eden City residents protested outside the complex on Friday and sealed the sales office inside the complex. “The promoters hand over flats to owners without completing the building and sealing life-threatening gaps like the one through which the child fell.
The authorities charge a maintenance fee of Rs 4,000- Rs 5,000 but do little,” said Sukanya Chakraborty, a homemaker on the 13th floor. On Friday, the promoters came met representatives of the association and Anwesha’s family at the local police station and reportedly promised to address the concerns at the earliest.
TOI tried to contact the promoters, Eden Real Estates Private Limited, but no one was willing to issue a statement till late on Friday. “We will take necessary action if the girl’s parents lodge a complaint,” said an officer of Maheshtala PS.