Close shave for Hry officer

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, April 19

A Haryana Government officer, putting up in House No. 1367, a government accommodation in Sector 28-B here, had a miraculous escape late last night when a 10-foot-long portion of the cantilever of the house fell on her Ford Ikon car parked in the porch of the house.

Minutes before the incident, the officer, Kiran Lekha Walia, Financial Adviser with the Haryana Finance Department, along with her daughter, Twinkle, had reached home. They passed beneath the cantilever to enter their house on the ground floor.

Due to the impact of the concrete, the rear side of the car and the rear windshield were badly damaged. Several such government houses in the city are in bad shape.

Five days ago, UT Adviser Vijay Kumar Dev, while on a visit to the area along with area councilor Satinder Singh, had directed officials of the UT Engineering Department to repair the government houses on a priority basis.  On being informed by the councillor, the Adviser, while taking a serious view of the situation, had asked the officials to do the needful at the earliest. 

Kuldeep Singh Walia, husband of the woman officer, said the UT Engineering Department had not bothered to repair the exterior of the houses for the past several years despite complaints made in this regard to the maintenance wing of the department. To justify his claim, he showed cracks in the structures and stairs. 

Narrating the horrifying incident, Kiran Lekha Walia said, “I entered my house at about 11.30 pm and around 11. 58 pm, the concrete portion fell on the car with a deafening sound and there was dust all around. Being alone with my daughter, I was afraid and thought some stranger was outside. Then I realised that something had fallen due to a dust storm. I was shocked to find my car damaged and debris lying all around.”

A CCTV camera installed at the entry door of the house enabled the family to see the footage to know what had exactly happened. “I was lucky to have crossed the spot before the incident,” she said, adding that it could have been fatal. With the help of area councillor Satinder, she called the police and rang up senior officials in the UT Engineering Department. 

UT Engineering Dept in a tizzy

Soon after being informed about the incident, the UT Engineering Department rushed to the spot, promising to get the official’s car repaired. Throughout the day, officials of the department visited the spot to get repair work started. Annoyed over the incident, Kuldeep Singh, husband of the officer, said he would file a compliant against the Engineering Department. “While the department spends lakhs of rupees on renovating houses of senior government officers, other houses are ignored,” he said.   

Unnecessary botheration!

The officer, Kiran Lekha, claimed, “A DSP-rank officer sent by the IGP to the spot, instead of assisting me, said he was unnecessarily bothered as no one had died.”