Mumbai, Sep 20: A tragic incident marred the Ganesh festival celebrations in Mumbai Lalbaug area after an electric shock near the pandal left two people dead and four others injured early on Sunday, officials said.

An 8-year-old girl died in the incident, while four others sustained serious injuries. A second death was reported later, when officials said a woman at Global Hospital had also succumbed to her injuries.

According to preliminary information from the fire brigade, the incident occurred at around 2 a.m. on Sunday when devotees were present near the pandal.

Two boys and three girls, aged between 8 and 20, reportedly came into contact with the electrical current and suffered burn injuries.

Following the incident, all five victims were rushed to Masina Hospital in Byculla for treatment. Doctors declared the 8-year-old girl Raghni Ghanshyam Yadav dead upon arrival.

Kiran Akbar Naik, 19, Tanvi Narsh Hande, 19, Sahil Sandip Tare, 19, and Ruhi Singh, 12, were undergoing treatment for injuries sustained in the incident.

Meanwhile, a second victim, a woman who was admitted to Global Hospital in Parel, later succumbed to her injuries. Her identity was yet to be ascertained.

Among the injured, one girl was reportedly in critical condition and was shifted to Global Hospital in Parel for further treatment. The remaining three injured victims are undergoing treatment at Masina Hospital and have been admitted to the intensive care unit (ICU), where their condition remains serious.

The incident has cast a pall of gloom over the festive celebrations in the Kalachowki area.

Further details on the circumstances that led to the electrical current spreading are awaited.

Mumbai, Sep 20: The aunt of the minor girl victim in the fatal electrocution incident near a Ganesh pandal in the Kalachowki area here on Sunday said that they had come to seek blessings of Lord Ganesh for the first time when the horrific incident occurred.

The tragic incident unfolded during the Ganesh festival celebrations near Kalachowki’s Mahaganpati pandal when the 8-year-old girl died after getting electrocuted. Four others sustained serious injuries. A second death was reported later, when officials said a woman in a hospital had also succumbed to her injuries.

Speaking to media, Kismati Yadav said they reached the area at around 2 a.m., joined the queue at around 2.15 a.m., and the incident occurred at around 2:40 a.m.

“There was a huge crowd, so we thought we would not go further and would take the child from the side. There was a shop selling ice cream and cold drinks, and there was some space there. We thought we would skip offering prayers, stand near the shop, and then return home. But as soon as we reached the shop, the crowd moved in there too, and chaos broke out,” she said.

The shopkeeper had put up a plastic sheet over his stall to protect it from the rain, she said. “Rainwater had collected on the plastic sheet. When the crowd pushed the water off the sheet, it came down on the people standing directly below it, and they were electrocuted,” she added.

Asked where they had come from, the victim’s aunt said they had travelled from Mankhor, Mandala, to witness Ganpati for the first time.

“We had come to see Ganpati for the first time in our lives, and this is how we were punished,” she said.

“I think the electric current had already entered the water. There were tables set up there…”

About their demands, she said, “Our child was taken away. She will not come back. No one should ever have to face something like this. We are poor. We had come from Uttar Pradesh to see Ganpati. Please share our ordeal with as many people as possible so that something like this never happens again. Our child will not come back.”

Mumbai, Sep 19: In a sharp political offensive against the Central government’s decision to introduce a 0.4 per cent Merchant Discount Rate (MDR) on select Unified Payments Interface (UPI) transactions above Rs 2,000, Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) Chief Raj Thackeray on Saturday alleged that the administration has ensnared the nation in a carefully laid “digital trap”.

In a detailed statement on social media platform X, the MNS Chief accused the ruling MahaYuti coalition-led Maharashtra government of lulling Indian citizens into a false sense of security with free digital transactions, only to quietly impose transaction fees and taxes once people became dependent on the platform.

Tracing the trajectory of digital payments from the 2016 Demonetisation move to the nationwide push for UPI adoption, Raj Thackeray said that the trajectory was planned to make citizens reliant on digital architecture before levying charges.

“First came Demonetisation; then the UPI system was introduced with great fanfare to showcase the push for digital transactions. They trumpeted its success, basked in self-praise, got people habituated to it, and then suddenly announced that fees would apply. In short, they lulled citizens into a false sense of security and quietly ensnared them in a digital trap,” he remarked.

He said that he had consistently warned the public against assuming that zero-fee digital services would remain permanent, saying that the government’s process of “coming knocking at your door” to collect revenues has now officially begun.

He questioned why permanent budgetary provisions for long-term maintenance and cybersecurity were not established during the initial investment phase if the intent was genuinely to simplify transactions rather than monetise them later.

Rejecting the Union government’s claim that the 0.4 per cent MDR burden falls solely on merchants, Raj Thackeray asserted that the Union government possesses zero monitoring mechanisms to prevent small and large businesses from passing the extra operational cost onto consumers.

He sharply criticised the levy of 18 per cent Goods and Services Tax (GST) on top of the MDR, accusing the Finance Ministry of attempting to “dip into citizens’ pockets wherever possible”.

Raising questions around international policy influences, Raj Thackeray cited Opposition’s allegations regarding US pressure and asked whether foreign card corporations and global payment networks influenced the policy decision.

Releasing a official government tweet screenshot from August 21, 2022 — which explicitly promised that UPI services would remain completely free — the MNS Chief called the recent policy shift evidence of “unclear and non-transparent intentions”.

He formally registered his party’s protest against the implementation of the Merchant Discount Rate.

Calling upon the trading community, small business owners, and retail associations to take a unified stand, Raj Thackeray urged merchants across Maharashtra and the nation to vehemently oppose paying the new transaction levies.