Hyderabad: Orthopedic specialist falls to death in under-construction lift shaft

Hyderabad: A 60-year-old Indore-based doctor who came to Hyderabad to discuss his daughter's wedding, accidentally slipped and fell into an under-construction elevator pit of a hotel in Banjara Hills on Friday night.

The deceased was Dr Pankaj Kumar Jain, who was the Head of the Orthopedic Department in Employees' State Insurance Corporation (ESIC) Hospital. He came to Hyderabad with his wife Asha and two daughters Anupama and Roopam as he arranged his elder daughter's wedding with a businessman here.

According to the Police, the incident took place when the family arrived here on March 17 and checked into a guesthouse at Koti. On the next day, they decided to move to The Landmark Hotel as it was close to Anupama's fiance Bezawada Bharath's house at MLA Colony. The family was allotted two rooms on the third and fourth floors.

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The police told The Hindu "About 10 p.m., his family started looking for him as he was supposed to meet them at the ground floor for dinner. They found him unconscious in the lift shaft, with bleeding injuries."

His family alleged that the lift was malfunctioning earlier as well when the two sisters on their way from the fourth floor were stuck in the same lift. They said that it was the hotel's negligence for not maintaining it.

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Police informed the Free Press Journal that "Jain was waiting for the lift on the sixth floor and ignorantly opened the door of an extra unused lift and stepped inside. He fell into the pit and suffered grievous injuries."

While speaking with TOI, Banjara Hills sub-inspector, B Praveen Kumar said, "There was a temporary mesh that was kept outside the shaft by hotel authorities. Pankaj fell directly into the shaft from the sixth floor. We are trying to find out why he went to the sixth floor, where it was dark."

Based on their complaint, A case has been registered under Section 304A (negligence causing death) of IPC against the hotel management and investigation is in process. As per the report in Free Press Journal, a friend of Dr Jain named Dr Pravin Agrawal told that "his body will be brought to Indore through Air Ambulance on Saturday evening."

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While his death was sudden and unfortunate, several other doctors and his fellow colleagues will remember him. A tribute was also paid to Dr. Jain by the Indian Medical Association-Indore. "He was one of the toppers of his batch in 1980. He had done MBBS and MS from MGM Medical College, Indore and had got second rank in the MPPMT exam in 1980," Dr Agrawal added.

He participated in the orthopedic conference 'INDOCON' which was held a few days ago in Indore.