A woman and her nine-month-old daughter Suviksha were charred to death in Bengaluru’s Whitefield on Sunday. The terrifying accident occurred at 6 am near Hope Farm Junction.
The 23-year-old woman — identified as Soundarya — by mistake stepped on a live wire belonging to the Bangalore Electricity Supply Company Limited (BESCOM).
According to The News Minute, sources at BESCOM have said that the live wire — connected with the F9 feeder — had suffered a jump cut, which is an abrupt interference in the power supply. The source said that usually, a jump cut should trigger an automatic tripping mechanism which is designed to ensure safety by disconnecting power at the time of any faults or anomalies in the system.
Mechanisms like jump cuts, automatic tripping systems are critical features which assure safety. These are typically triggered by protective devices/systems such as circuit breakers or relays leading to quick isolation of the faulty sections. This in turn prevents any extensive damage from taking place and also balancing the dependability of the power distribution network.
Reportedly, it was said that the although the automated tripping mechanism did take place, a wire had loosened and fallen on the footpath, of which the BESCOM was unaware of.
And despite the potential threat, power supply was restored without checking for any faulty wires or other issues because consumers in the area did not raise any complaints.
A First Information Report (FIR) has been registered against five BESCOM officials at the Kadugodi police station under Indian Penal Code (IPC) section 304A (causing death by negligence). These five persons are, executive engineer Sriram, assistant engineer Subramanya, Assistant engineer Chetan, joint engineer Rajanna, and station operator Manjunath.
Karnataka’s Energy minister KJ George has said that an inquiry has been launched into the incident and its report is now awaited. “The line man, AE and AEE have been suspended for dereliction of duty,” George said in a X post. He added that stringent actions will be taken against any of the other persons responsible for the incident.
However, the five BESCOM officials were released on station bail later.
The Energy minister also declared an ex-gratia of “Rs 5 lakh each to the family members who have lost their kins in this incident”.
Meanwhile, the state’s BJP unit took a dig at the ruling-Congress government and said that it is “directly responsible for this death”.
The BJP unit, in an X post said, “Even in populated areas like Bengaluru, a power line has fallen, but as a result of BESCOM’s insistence on not clearing it, a mother and child, who were supposed to survive, died after stepping on the power line in Bengaluru.” They further added, “Hey DCM @DKShivakumar, this is your real brand Bangalore!! The irresponsible and corrupt Congress government is directly responsible for this death.”
In a similar incident, four siblings of a family were electrocuted after they came in a contact with a high-speed pedestal fan in their house in Lalman Kheda village under the Barasagwar police station in Uttar Pradesh’s Unnao district.
The incident took place when all of the elders of the house had gone to work. The four children, aged nine, eight, six, and four respectively were alont at home.
One of the four kids touched the pedestal fan and on hearing the child’s scream, the other three ran to save her but sadly, they too were electrocuted. All the four kids died on the spot.
(With inputs from IANS)