How 41 Laborers Stuck in Uttarakhand Tunnel? | Uttarakhand Tunnel Rescue Story

The rescue of the 41 workers. just look at the state of hospitals, construction & roads around you, or indeed look at the traffic, you will know the truth of these claims. Poverty forces these workers into the same unsafe, deadly environments repeatedly. How 41 Laborers Stuck in Uttarakhand Tunnel? | Uttarakhand Tunnel Rescue Story

How 41 Laborers Stuck in Uttarakhand Tunnel?

The lives of 41 laborers are at stake in Uttarkashi. These workers have been trapped in debris since Nov 12. The rescue work came to a halt on the 17th Nov afternoon as it wasn’t established if the rescue machine broke down or debris fell on it. Overall, no effort in rescuing them from the tunnel has been successful so far.

It’s been days but debris hasn’t been removed to rescue them. It shows how poor our preparations are & how feeble our capacity is. To cover up our own carelessness & failure, Gods and goddesses are being invoked. A new temple has been built near the mouth of the tunnel. Locals say that many old temples had been demolished for the tunnel, this is the wrath of the Gods.

Is this why a temple has been built at the mouth of the tunnel? 41 workers are reportedly still alive. The construction company has said that they are in contact & workers have food & oxygen. Now, even the media is not allowed near the site. Many reporters have said this. The families of the trapped have been living around the tunnel for many days.

The state govt has ordered better arrangements for them, and even deployed more officers. But the real question is about the rescue of the 41 workers. A week has passed since the rescue work began but not 1 man has been rescued. The families allege the administration, has not given them regular & reliable info on the rescue.

Every second of their lives is at stake in this tunnel. Workers from Bihar, Jharkhand, UP, West Bengal, Odisha, Uttarakhand & HP are trapped. At times, the work stops or the machine breaks down. Food & oxygen are available to the workers. The families are being told they are safe & healthy inside the tunnel.

When rescue work stopped on 17 Nov afternoon, it could not resume till 18 Nov morning. The lives of 41 people are under threat but all goes on as per routine. The way construction work is going on in the Himalayan ranges; in the name of “development” & “all-weather roads”, people have stopped thinking/ listening; the results are visible in regular natural disasters.

Each new disaster, we hear the same platitudes from the previous one. Besides saving these men, issues are never reviewed thoroughly or critically examined. Once decisions have been taken, all state forces begin to justify them. Who is responsible for this accident? What negligence led to this? Such questions arise & die, ‘not with a bang but a whimper’.

You’d remember that in 2006, when a 4-year-old boy named Prince fell into a tunnel in Haryana, news channels covered it incessantly until his rescue. There has been some coverage in the 41-workers case, but it is negligible when compared to the 2006 scale. The question “Why is there no 2006-type coverage now?” also demands answers.

The India of 2023 is markedly different. Journalists in today’s India are themselves trapped in a tunnel of power. Had this been 2006, these journalists/editors would easily beat the desire to be seen with the PM at the Diwali celebrations, instead going to cover the Silkyara Tunnel. MLAs & MPs would all be visiting the site.

The Diwali fete would’ve been postponed. Alas, today, the media has merged into powers that be. Do not delude yourself into thinking these live pictures of the Diwali fete are press conference visuals. Remember, remember that PM Modi, seen here with journalists as a well-wisher, has NOT done a single live press conference with these journos since 2014.

The father of the trapped child from the Kurukshetra incident was also a daily wage labourer. Back then, it seemed the whole country was standing with him. Today, 41 laborers are trapped in the Uttarkashi tunnel, the entire media is with the PM. After the inauguration of the new Parliament & the Convention Center in Delhi, the PM honoured the workers there.

Even after 41 laborers were trapped here, the Diwali celebrations went on. The PM, who has NOT held a single open press conference in 10 years, preached to the journalists that ‘deep-fakes’ are a big danger! This is a technology by which a person’s voice/ face can be recreated, and shown doing or speaking anything.

But even within his deepfake example, the PM gave a fake example. He said that in a deep fake video of him, he can be seen dancing to Garba. On this, Zubair of Alt News has tweeted that the video is authentic, and NOT a deep fake! In that video, a known lookalike of the PM played the Garba. So this is not the India of 2006; so the incident of 41 workers trapped in a tunnel is not a national issue.

No matter how loudly we may claim that, we are set to become the 3rd largest global economy, just look at the state of hospitals, construction & roads around you, or indeed look at the traffic, you will know the truth of these claims. Poverty forces these workers into the same unsafe, deadly environments repeatedly.

Manjeet Lal’s story was carried in the Time of India. Manjeet Lal is also trapped in the Uttarkashi tunnel. A year back, his elder brother was working in a Mumbai high-rise construction, and he died due to electrocution. Even after the death of a brother, Lal entered the same world of labor, where safety standards are enforced very weakly.

Clearly, we see concern for poor lives only in the PM’s speeches. From the media reports on the tunnel accident, it is clear that the tunnel construction company has made many mistakes. The first mistake is that the strength of the rocks at the tunnel site was ignored. Could these rocks withstand explosives? This question was neglected.

Another question is if excessive explosives were used? When tunneling technology is highly developed across the world, and it is considered safe even for the mountains, then why were explosives used at all? The second mistake is that: as the tunnel construction progresses, a pipe called the Hume pipe is also inserted along.

Workers use it to evacuate in case of debris or collapse. If these pipes were there, efforts would have been made to evacuate the workers using them.

Why Uttarakhand Tunnel pipe was removed while the work is going on?

This pipe should have been removed only when the tunnel is completely ready for movement. Behind these questions it is being seen that generally, companies do not follow such safety standards seriously. A newspaper has stated that this pipe laid here was taken out some time ago. That was also a mistake. How can this pipe be removed while the work is going on? Congress is also raising this question.

Himalayan experts say that building tunnels in the mountains is safer if safety protocols are followed strictly. The company on this project is not new, it is considered quite experienced. Navyug Company of Andhra Pradesh has built the longest bridge on the Brahmaputra River. Which is called a miracle of engineering.

Why Uttarakhand Tunnel accident occur?

This project is worth Rs 853 crore. This is the state of safety even in such a huge project. Whether the company was negligent on safety standards, or it could not escape the fact that this area is geologically weak, building such tunnels here is not free from danger. Media reports show that despite building a 4.5 km long tunnel, there were no proper security/ safety arrangements.

According to the rules, the strength of the soil and rocks is tested every 10 meters. Did the construction company get any indications that there could be danger ahead, or was it not checked at all, and the workers were sent to work in the tunnel? Reports also state that there is no safety point anywhere, if there was, then there would have been a way for the workers to evacuate.

At times, companies write the project report as per their needs, which has little to do with the ground reality. Local journalists are saying that there is a huge difference between what is written in the project report & what is visible on the ground. The geology of this region has been a challenge since the beginning.

The Uttarakhand CM has said that safety checks will be conducted at all the projects underway in the state, but this should be a part of routine procedures. The work should not have even started without them. Yet again, this shows how poorly our projects are prepared to tackle accidents.

Experts from an Australian consultancy company, and Rail Vikas Nigam Limited, have reached Uttarkashi to help with the rescue operation. A machine, airlifted from Indore, left from Jolly Grant Airport late at night. Machine parts have reached Kandisaud. All this is part of the Char Dham project, stated to be PM Modi’s “dream project”.

The Navyug company, that is building this tunnel, has also got contracts worth Rs 2072 crore in Rishikesh-Karnprayag Railway Project. Actually, the project is said to be worth Rs 23000 crore. Gangotri & Yamunotri routes are being connected through all-weather roads. Because these regions receive heavy snowfall.

In the last few years, so many questions were raised on the Chardham project, and numerous accidents occurred, but there was no reconsideration of this project, rather, it has also received the Supreme Court’s stamp of approval. Continuous blasting has weakened the mountains. Due to excessive explosions, water from the mountains starts seeping into the tunnels, which then collapse.

Not only do the mountains weaken, but the tunnels also become dangerous. Regional experts say that these are raw mountains. Hard stones are lesser in number. Many geologists have warned that, due to the indiscriminate use of explosives in the Char Dham project, the Himalayan mountains are getting weaker. There should be some balance between development & explosion; we must understand, How many roads/bridges/tunnels we need in a small state? We have already seen the state of affairs in Himachal Pradesh.

Hundreds of roads were washed away in a week-long rain, an equal number of bridges were swept away. Hopefully, the 41 workers trapped now, will be evacuated safely soon.