Saviour’s act goes in vain - Teenager pulls out child and youth from toxic gas pit

Saviour’s act goes in vain
Teenager pulls out child and youth from toxic gas pit

Sanjay Singh, 17, stumbled upon a pair of flailing hands sticking out of a manhole on AJC Bose Road, off SSKM Hospital, on Tuesday morning. The hands belonged to a child struggling to come out.

What followed was a series of coordinated actions led by the teenager, that led to the rescue of the child and a youth from the pit.

Sanjay Oraon, 27, who was frothing in the mouth following inhalation of poisonous gas, was rushed to SSKM Hospital, where he died hours later.

There was a third person in the manhole who was dead when Singh peeped through the opening. Police said the man, Ratan Burman, died of the toxic effect of the gas inside. Both Oraon and Burman were from Baidyabati, Hooghly.

Neither could the child be traced, nor was there any explanation of what led him to enter the manhole. “He must have been inside for a minute or even less and ran away after being pulled out,” the officer added.

Oraon, Burman and two others — engaged by a public works department (PWD) contractor — were working in the manhole, off the post office gate of SSKM Hospital, for the past two days.
“Oraon entered the pit around 8am on Tuesday. He felt breathless a few minutes later and cried out for help, prompting Burman to jump in to his rescue,” said an officer of Hastings police station.

Singh, who works in a jewellery store on Pretoria Street, was on way to work with colleagues Utpal and Ujjal, who are twins, when he spotted the child’s outstretched arms.

“I paused, bent down and pulled him out. Then I saw another man inside, submerged and struggling to hold on to the iron railings,” recalled Singh.

“Utpal and Ujjal, walking a few steps ahead, had joined me by then and the three of us dropped down a rope tied to a bucket. The man caught hold of the rope and came out,” said Singh. The three looked down again and saw a body floating in the water.

Civic officials, including chief engineer (drainage) Tushar Kanti Ghosh and mayoral council member (sewerage) Farzana Chaudhury, came to the spot. Chaudhury alleged that the PWD had not taken permission from the civic body before starting to clean the manhole.
The civic officials later started a “flushing operation” to find out whether anyone else was trapped in the pit.

A case of negligence has been lodged against the PWD contractor who hired the four workers.

Source: http://www.telegraphindia.com/1070822/asp/calcutta/story_8220360.asp

Resentment over burning of effigy

Resentment over burning of effigy
All Faith Forum, a city-based organisation that represents various religious bodies, demanded immediate action against a section of people who, under the banner of People’s Synod, had recently burnt the effigy of Reverend P.S.P. Raju, the bishop of the Calcutta diocese of the Church of North India. The forum is engaged in various activities for promoting communal harmony. Gloria Probal, the general secretary of the forum, claimed on Tuesday that the act had hurt the sentiments of a large number of Christians and the “culprits” should be immediately punished.

Major Festivals of Kolkata

Ganga Sagar Mela (January):
This festival is celebrated at Sagar which is about 105km south of Kolkata where the Ganga and the Bay of Bengal form a nexus. Hence the name Gangasagar Mela.

Vast number of Sadhus and pilgrims congregate here from all over the country to visit the Kapil Muni Temple and to take a holy dip in the sea particularly on the Makara Sankranti day when the sun makes a transition to Capricorn from Sagittarius and this town becomes home to vast fairs, drawing visitors and recluses from all over the state. It is one of the largest annual assemblage of devotees in India.

Holi (March):
Holi which is also known as Dol Purnima is the spring festival widely observed across India with the spraying of coloured water, paint and powder. more..

Ratha Yatra (June - July):
This car festival at Mahesh Near Srirampur which is 25km from Calcutta is very famous.

Id (June - July):
Id is celebrated by thousands of the city’s Muslims in congregational prayer on the Maidan. During Muharram, they process beating their chests, chanting the names of Hassan and Hussain, the two martryed grandsons of Muhammad. They carry replicas of the Mecca tombs.

Durga Puja (September-October):
The worship of the ‘Clay Goddess’ (Durga) is the most important Hindu festival of Kolkata (Calcutta). The city livens up with celebrations of music, dance and drama which last for 15 days. The celebrations end with the immersion of clay idols of Durga Devi in the river Ganges on the evening of Dashami.

Diwali (Oct-Nov):
Diwali or Kali Puja is the festival of lights. It is observed in Calcutta as elsewhere in North India. Dover Lane

Music Festival (Dec- Jan):
Dover Lane Music Conference, one of the largest Indian Classical musical events is conducted at Nazrul Mancha in South Avenue, Kolkata every year between January 22 and 26. The music conference which started as a humble get together of some music lovers in the by lanes of South Kolkata five decades ago, has now turned into one of the culturally most important event of the year with the presence of a number of eminent music maestros from all over the country. This festival provides a wonderful platform for the younger generation to come and perform with the best in the field. The people of Kolkata consider this festival as a heritage event.

Kolkata General Information

History:
Prior to the establishment of British Calcutta, there were three pre-existing Bengali villages in the area: Suttanutte (or Sutani) and Gobindpore (or Govindapur, which formed the nucleus of Calcutta) plus one village by the name of Kalikata, the least important of the three. It seems likely that both ‘Calcutta’ (English) and ‘Kolkata’ (Bengali) were derived from ‘Kalikata’. Kolkata’s history is intimately related to the British East India Company, which first arrived in 1690, and to British India, of which Calcutta became the capital in 1772 and remained so until 1912. The Englishman, Job Charnock, is traditionally credited with founding the city, although this notion has been challenged in recent years, mostly by Bengalis, who prefer to believe that the original three villages represented a preexisting settlement - chiefly Gobindpore. The city was occupied by a large Bengali force in 1756, immediately after which occured the infamous Black Hole of Calcutta incident. Calcutta, briefly renamed Alinagur, was quickly retaken the following year by a small British force under Sir Robert Clive. In the nineteenth century Calcutta was the centre of activity in the early stages of the national movement of independence. In 1943 the city suffered an acute famine and its port was bombed by the Japanese. In 1946 there was an outbreak of violence between Hindus and Muslims, which claimed over 2,000 lives.Despite such challenges, Kolkata remained in the forefront of Indian prosperity up to independence and for some more years afterwards before the population pressure on infrastructure and political disturbances led to a gradual decline. A violent and bloody Marxist-Maoist movement known as the Naxal movement (after Naxalbari, the place where it first started) in the 1970s left the city badly bruised. The city’s recovery process gathered steam after India’s liberalization in the early nineties. From January 1, 2001, the local government decided to change ‘Calcutta’ to ‘Kolkata’ and passed the law legalising the name on July 30, 2001

Geography:

Total Area : 187.33 Sq. Km. (Including Added Area)

S. S. Unit : 30.38 Sq. Km.

Jadavpur : 40.00 Sq. Km.

Garden Reach : 12.95 Sq. Km.

Calcutta City : 104.00 Sq. Km.

Religion and languages:
Main languages spoken in Calcutta are Bengali, Hindi, Gujarati, Malayalam, Oriya, Punjabi, Tamil and Urdu.

Religion-wise, breakup of population of Calcutta is indicated below as per 1991 census :

Hindus - 3546431

Muslims - 779433

Christians - 38155

Sikhs - 15786

Buddhists - 6171

Jains -13053

Other religions - 757

Religions not stated - 33

Climate:
Calcutta has a subtropical climate, with summer monsoons. The annual mean temperature is 26.8 °C, and monthly mean temperatures range from 20 °C to 31 °C and maximum temperatures in Calcutta often exceed 40 °C during May-June.The lowest temperature hovers around 12 - 14 °C in the winter months of December and January.Winter is short- lasting - about 2 and a half months.
The main seasonal influence upon the climate is the monsoon. Maximum rainfall occurs during the monsoon in August (306 mm) and the average annual total is 1,582 mm.
Early morning mists are common. Evening smog often occurs due to nighttime temperature inversions and mixing heights are generally restricted to below 500 m during the night.
Summer is dominated by strong south-westerly monsoon winds. Mean ventilation coefficients are greatest in the pre-monsoon (8,118 m2s-1) and monsoon (7,410 m2s-1) periods. Total duration of sunshine is 2,528 hours per annum with maximum insolation occurring in March

References:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page