DFS officers pay tribute to Amit Balyan on Friday. Balyan died on Thursday while carrying out rescue operations at a battery manufacturing unit.
Minutes after 28-year-old fire operator Amit Balyan found himself trapped under debris inside a burning factory, his brother-in-law Amit Pawar, also a fireman, tried to enter. But he was stopped by seniors, who warned him that the structure was shaky and crumbling.
“My husband survived because his seniors stopped him from entering. I wish someone would have stopped my brother as well,” Pawar’s wife Monika said. Balyan was among four men trapped after a part of the building, owned by inverter battery manufacturer Okaya, collapsed around 9 am in Outer Delhi’s Mundka. Seventeen firemen were injured in the operation. Balyan was the last man to be pulled out from the rubble, and was declared dead on arrival at the hospital.
Pawar, a fireman at Rohini fire station, said: “When someone told me some men were stuck inside, I was about to rush in, but the entire structure was shaking and another portion fell. When my seniors read out a list of names, I was shocked to find Amit’s name,” said Pawar.
Balyan and his wife Shivani (26), a Ghaziabad Police constable, said she last spoke to him Wednesday night about her transfer. “Around 5 am, he messaged me saying there was a fire and he would return later. Hours later, my father-in-law informed me about his injuries, but nobody told me he was trapped under debris. When he was pulled out, we thought he would survive, but he never returned.” His mother Munesh said she won’t let her younger son Anuj become a “policeman or firefighter” any more: “We respect Amit’s sacrifice, but can’t handle another loss.”
I called my father-in-law and informed him immediately. I reached around 9-10 am. The couple got married in February 2019.
