Rope of ‘jugad’ ropeway trolley at Kangra temple breaks, couple dies
Talwara (Hoshiarpur), May 20
A ropeway trolley made by a private vendor’s ‘jugad’ technology to transport goods from bottom to the uphill temple in the ancient Hari Om Shiv temple located in Ghati Bilva village near Pong Dam in Kangra district of Himachal Pradesh met with an accident on Sunday evening. The accident occurred around 5 pm, in which two of the four persons on board (husband and wife) died while two other youths were injured.
Dehra police station in-charge Sandeep Pathania and outpost in-charge Sansarpur Terrace SI Sanjeev Sharma said members of a family from Mukerian city, including Dinesh Behl, his wife Sonika Behl, his son Shubham Behl and his friend Rajbir Singh, around 4 pm on Sunday, had come to pay obeisance at the ancient temple. Instead of using stairs to the temple, they chose to board the ropeway trolley installed by the temple management committee to transport goods to the temple. When trolley reached halfway to the temple, the rope used to pull the trolley towards the temple broke, following which the trolley speedily headed downwards and collided with a ramp. As a result of this, four of them fell down, said the police officials.
Dinesh Behl and his wife Sonika Behl were seriously injured in the accident and died while being taken to a private hospital in Mukerian. Their son Shubham Behl and his friend Rajbir Singh are undergoing treatment.
Dehra DSP Anil Kumar said as soon as the information about the accident was received, Sansarpur Terrace outpost in-charge reached the spot with his team and registered a case against the temple committee. The postmortem examination of the deceased was conducted at Civil Hospital Mukerian and the bodies were handed over to their family.
The police have registered a case against the temple committee and started investigation.
