Elphinstone stampede families cope with loss, one day at a time

MUMBAI: Each day when Purshottam Alva returns home to Kanjurmarg after work, he finds that one of his two daughters is always home. Each time he appears pensive or withdrawn, the girls make a joke and bring his smile back. Often when he gets a task wrong, they tease him mercilessly like their mother would do. Every day in myriad ways, the children try to help him overcome the absence of his wife Sujatha, who was killed in the Elphinstone Road station foot over-bridge stampede.

Saturday, September 29, marks one year since the incident, which claimed 23 lives and left 39 injured.It was the ninth day of Navratri; the disaster brought a tragic end to the festival.
The families of the deceased are picking up the pieces, one day at a time. The station has been renamed as Prabhadevi and the Army has constructed a new bridge. Compensation has been paid and household duties have been assumed by survivors. But the pangs of loss rear their head ever so often.
Sujatha’s daughters Pragnya and Prerna simply do not travel to Prabhadevi station. Pragnya said, “We are both working professionals and most leading corporates have their office in this erstwhile milltown locality. Yet I have decided that I will not travel to this station. I will take a taxi from Dadar if I must. My sister is doing her articleship and requests her boss to avoid giving her assignments there.” At home, the girls keep a strong front for their father's sake. “We tell him to think that mummy has gone to the village and will come back,” said Pragnya.
They repeat the same words of assurance to their friend Nidhi, whose mother, Sumalatha Shetty, too died in the stampede. The women had been travelling to the Elphinstone flower market together to buy white shevanti flowers for Dussehra the following day. Nidhi said, “I was angry at the authorities at first, but then I felt we citizens also need to do more. Of course, the railways could have built the bridge at Elphinstone Road faster because the proposal had already been passed. Then maybe the stampede could have been avoided.”
Over in Vasai, the young sons of flower trader Alex Correa have the creature comforts they need, but regret being unable to serve him in his old age. “One is an engineer and the other a chartered accountant. So, their financial loss is not as great as their emotional loss. They keep feeling they did not get to say one final goodbye. Their mother has recovered and is doing well now,” said Alex’s friend Robin Lopes.
Lopes misses his friend deeply. “Alex would come to our farm to collect mogra, jui and hibiscus flowers, which he would sell in Mumbai. So we would meet every single day. The only consolation was that we were able to give him an elaborate funeral at the Holy Spirit Church,” he said.
BMC telephone operator Balu Pasalkar lost his young daughter Priyanka, who had just begun her career and was earning Rs 35,000 per month. The compensation of Rs 8 lakh works out to just two years’ salary. Pasalkar said, “I have two younger sons who are studying. So, Priyanka was such a help to both on the financial front and for moral support. Who can make up for the void left in our hearts? Last Monday, we held a ritual to mark her anniversary by the Hindu calendar. The memories of the tragedy washed over as if it had been yesterday.”
Another victim Hiloni Dedhia, 23, had just begun a career as chartered accountant with Axis Bank. A friend of the family said, "The government should work out a way to fund infrastructure in localities where rapid commercial construction is taking place. After all as the working population in an area increases, the crowds become unmanageable. Perhaps the authorities should impose a cess on construction in localities like Parel. After all their own employees will be safer once infrastructure improves."