Mumbai Congress chief Sanjay Nirupam on Sunday accused Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis of “fooling Mumbaikars to shield the culprits behind countless deaths” in various recent mishaps that took places in the metropolis due to “sheer negligence” of the Maharashtra Government and Brihanmumbai Municpal Corporation (BMC).

Referring to the Foot Over Bridge (FOB) collapse near Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Termius (CSMT) in which six persons were killed and 30 others injured and three major mishaps witnessed in the city in the recent past, Nirupam said: “ In each of the cases, it’s the smaller officers who have been made the scapegoats while the bigger officials who have been involved have gotten away scot free”.

Alluding to the unfortunate Kamala Mills mishap in  14 innocent Mumbaikars were killed and 55 others injured in December 2017, Nirupam said that while the chief minister ordered BMC Chief Ajoy Mehta to take strong action against erring officials immediately. 

“A report based on the probe conducted by the Additional Municipal Commissioner Vijay Singhal found 12 BMC officials guilty. During the entire Kamala Mills fire row, several questions were raised against the BMC Chief but no action was taken,” the City Congress chief said.

“After the the September 29,2017 FOB stampede at Elphinstone Road stationwhich claimed 23 lives and left 39 others injured, the chief minister said that the Railways will conduct an inquiry into the incident and take strict action. Instead, Fadnavis turned his guns on the innocent hawkers ordering their eviction from the Railway premises,” Nirupam said.

Raising question over the chief minister’s “desperate attempts” to shield the “failing” civic administration, Nirupam charged that the chief minister shifted the blame to the Railway authorities, by giving a clean chit to the BMC in Andheri’s Gokhale Bridge collapse incident. “In that case, the chief  minister said that the responsibility of maintaining and conducting a safety audit of the bridge lay with the railway authority which was not done,”  the Congress leader said.

“And now the fourth incident CSMT FOB collapse, only 2 junior engineers have been dismissed...Fadnavis cannot fool the people of Maharashtra and Mumbai for far too long. People know that it is always the junior officers who get the sack whereas the nexus between the officials at highest posts and the politicians sadly continues to thrive,” he said.