A 27-year-old call centre employee from Nagaland died and her two Manipuri colleagues were injured after they mysteriously fell from the fourth floor of their office’s terrace in South Delhi’s Safdurjung Enclave area in the wee hours of Sunday. Police said prima facie it appeared that the trio accidently fell one after the other in an attempt to save each other. Police have recovered some liquor bottles from the spot hinting they were consuming liquor when the accident took place.
The deceased, identified as lovi, lived in Humayuput in South Delhi. The injured — Jacob and Robert, both in their late 20s — are recuperating at AIIMS Trauma Centre. They live in Gurgaon and Delhi’s Munirka, respectively. They have received multiple fractures in their heads and other parts of the body.
A police official of the South district said the incident took place around 3.30 am in Safdurjung Enclave’s Arjun Nagar, a densely-populated locality. On the fourth floor of a residential building, a United States (US)-based call centre is being run from a room with a terrace. “The call centre’s franchise is in the name of one Hari Narayan, who also lives in the same building with his family. He has employed 8-10 youths for data entry and making calls,” said a police officer.
The call centre in the name of BTl Edu Teleservices provides education-related services had been operating from the building for the past three months. Its manager Hari Narayan said it generally operated from Monday to Friday, but an increase in workload led him to call four employees over the weekend.
“As the call centre works in the night, all the workers stay in the office. Around 3.30 am, I heard a sound of something falling on the ground. When I peeped out of my window, I found three people lying on the road. By the time I came down, Hari Narayan and other persons who live in the building gathered on the ground floor,” said Nitish, who lives on the third floor with his family.
Somebody made a PCR call and the trio were rushed to the hospital where doctors declared lovi brought dead.
Investigators, prima facie, suspect it to be the case of accident but probing from all possible angles. Hari Narayan and his three more staff members, including two girls, were also present inside the call centre when the incident took place.
Sources in the police said the three were taking alcohol at the terrace on the fourth floor. They were sitting near the fence and it appears that one of them, lost balance and fell down. The other two lost balance while trying to save the colleague and they too fell down with a loud thud. They were hit by a metallic shed of a window on third floor as they hurtled down.
A case under Section 304A and 337 of the Indian Penal Code has been registered at Safdurjung Police Station. Police have recorded the statements of Hari Narayan and his other staff members. They were also waiting for Robert and Jacob to be declared fit for statement to ascertain the exact cause of the incident.