Death of Shri Ram Prakash

April 2008.

(As documented by concerned community members.)

Ram Prakash, a mali (gardener) with a contractor, received grievous injury to his head while at work in the campus sometime during the night of 12th April to the morning of 13th April and he died on 26th April, 2008.

What Happened?

Actually none of the various sets of people who ought to have access to what happened on that night are ready to talk about it. This is what we could piece together from Ram Prakash's father and his uncle and several workers who would like to remain anonymous.

Shri Ram Prakash was 20 years old and was the eldest of 7 children - four sisters and three brothers. His father a mason was the only other earning member of the family. Ram Prakash has been working in the campus for the last three years under the same contractor. For a few days prior to the incident Ram Prakash was assigned night duty by the contractor to water the dug up IIT field. His duty hours involved the whole night. He left house on the 12th night as usual. On the 13th morning the contractor informed the family that their son had an accident and they should come and pick him up from the campus. Ram Prakash's father Mr Shri Ram immediately left for the campus on the contractor's motor cycle. He was taken to the IIT nursery where he found his son in a semi-conscious state with a bandage on his head. He was informed that Ram Prakash had fallen down in the night on concrete floor, was picked up by the SIS guards, taken to the health centre and a bandage had been put on the wound. The contractor then gave the father a sum of Rs 200 and asked him to get somebody to put stitches on the wound. Mr Shri Ram took Ram Prakash in a rickshaw to a nearby private clinic (on Bithoor road) for the stitches and took him home. But he was not doing well, and on 21st April, a week from the accident, his condition became serious - he lost speech completely. In the next couple of days the frantic family took him around several hospitals but his condition got worse. Probably on the 23rd he went into a coma and kept having repeated fits where his limbs and the whole body shook involuntarily and then went stiff; he had high fever too. The family with very limited resources took loans and spent almost Rs 50,000 but could not save Ram Prakash; he died on the 26th April.

Issues of Grave Concern

Last year there were three deaths in a month and the Institute made a commitment to the community that it is going to put the right systems and procedures in place. This case once again shows that the Institute has not kept its promise and one can find obvious lapses on various fronts:

• • No reliable record of contingent work force - who, how many, where employed?

  • No procedures in place for safe working conditions, night time duty, proper supervision, etc. to avoid such accidents at work.

  • No proper medical procedure in place in spite of Institute's public commitments over a year back.

  • No official mechanism to follow up such incidents - the Institute does not even acknowledge the accident let alone initiate follow up actions including medical assistance and compensation.

  • An environment of extreme threat by the contractors on the contingent workforce, so that not even the co workers feel confident in reporting the incident or even talk about it.