India’s Main Airport Roof Collapse Kills One, Injures Eight
By Stefan J. Bos, Chief International Correspondent Worthy News
NEW DELHI (Worthy News) – An entire terminal at India’s busiest airport was evacuated Friday after a roof collapsed under heavy rainfall and winds, killing at least one person, injuring eight others, and highlighting broader concerns about infrastructure in the South Asian nation.
Friday’s accident at the main airport in India’s capital, New Delhi, led to the cancellation of flights.
A portion of the canopy at the departure area of Delhi airport’s Terminal 1 collapsed early in the morning and flight operations were shut down until 2 p.m. local time India’s aviation minister told reporters.
A bigger tragedy was prevented as some 100 people were present at the spot when the incident took place, Indian sources said. The canopy tilted before coming down, allowing most people to escape, according to eyewitnesses.
The deceased, unable to leave in time, was identified as Ramesh Kumar, 45, a taxi driver who arrived to drop off a passenger and was about to head home when the incident took place.
The roof collapse underscored Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s challenges to make India a global aviation hub and raised questions about the rapid pace of infrastructure development in India, commentators said.
The collapse added to a growing list of incidents involving infrastructure over the past year that prompted questions from opposition party politicians and experts about the risks of lax regulation and the fast pace at which projects are completed.
“Quality should not be compromised to chase speed,” Ameya Joshi, an independent aviation analyst, told Reuters news agency.
He also called for mechanisms to audit existing infrastructure, saying the Delhi roof which collapsed was an older structure.
Modi has been betting his political legacy on issues such as extensive infrastructure development for years.
The Indian government and private companies want to spend $12 billion building new airports and expanding existing ones to make air travel as accessible and affordable as the country’s vast rail network.
It is only a tiny part of Modi’s broader $1 trillion infrastructure push across the world’s most populated country of over 1.4 billion people, slightly more than China.
Modi’s plans include making India a rival to big aviation hubs like Dubai and Singapore.
Since Modi came to power in 2014, India’s operational airports have nearly doubled to 140, and the government plans to increase this to 220 before the end of the decade.
In a video titled “Revolutionizing Airports,” posted by Modi on the video-sharing service YouTube, he recently boasted that an upgrade of Delhi T1 had cost $553 million. However, the collapsed roof was not part of it.
The video also said how many new terminals, like one in Jabalpur in central India, have been built.
But problems are emerging. Earlier this week, part of a canopy at Jabalpur airport in Madhya Pradesh also collapsed after heavy rains, footage showsd. The new building cost $50 million and was inaugurated by Modi in March.
“Every airport in the country must undergo an immediate safety inspection and a periodic review cycle should be set up,” Arghya Sengupta, a research director at Vidhi Centre for Legal Policy said on social media site X.
But those advises came too late for the late taxi driver Joshi leaving behind a family in a nation still marred by widespread poverty and lacking adequate social services, despite a growing middle class.
Those undergoing treatment at different hospitals were named as Santosh Kumar Yadav 28, Dasarath Ahirwar, 25, Arvind, 34, Sahil Sudan, 27, and 44-year-old Yogesh Dhawan.
The injured include another cab driver, airport staff and a passenger. Three other people, all passengers, reporestly told police they didn’t sustain any serious injuries.
With India seeking more economic power, teams of experts were seen rushing to enable India’s largest airport to fully function again on Saturday.
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