True grit on 23rd floor: Man saves self, cousin

But Chitrasen Sabar had jumped on a slab above a window the moment the scaffolding started shaking violently, and just as he saw four of his mates fall, he looked down and saw his cousin Khetru go down with the poles.

“Khetru saw me and held up his hand. I grabbed at it,” Chitrasen said. In a few seconds both realised the danger they were in. Twenty-three floors above the ground, with not a thing to hold on to for support, Chitrasen hung on while Khetru dangled with his back to the building. “I asked Chitra to hold tight as I swerved around, and then he adjusted his grasp accordingly,” said Khetru.

He then waited for the people inthe flat below to open the window and let him in.

Meanwhile, Chitrasen, who had been standing on the slab when the scaffolding fell, planted his feet firmly on the ground and lowered himself into a sitting position. “That was the most stable position then, otherwise Khetru’s swings would have caught me off balance sooner or later,” he said.

Death looked up at them from the ground in the form of four mates Sandeep Pahangale, Suresh Pahangale, Prahlad Kumar and Shankar, lying with their bodies smashed beyond recognition. “I felt scared when I saw them being taken away. So I started looking up. I could have been one of them. Fortunately they were too far down below for me to actually see their bodies,” said Khetru.

The prospect of these perilous moments being his last tied knots in Chitrasen’s stomach too. “I can’t explain the feeling, it was just there. Then I decided that even if I die I will save Khetru’s life as long as possible,” he said. He hung on for dear life, and his mate’s.

Ten minutesof the struggle began to tell on Chitrasen as pain crept up on his muscles in the stomach, calves and hands. “I told him I couldn’t hold for long, and asked him to break the window open,” he said.

Khetru started swinging his body with all the effort he could muster and banged against the window. “I had learnt to swing on the branches of trees back home. I never thought I would need to do the same at such a height,” said Khetru with a sardonic smile. sFive such tries later, he shattered the window panes and found his lower limbs inside the flat.

Then started the second phase of the rescue operation. Chitrasen knew he couldn’t let go of his mate’s hands suddenly, for he couldn’t judge how well-enconsced Khetru was inside the window. Moreover, there was also the danger of his falling off if the pressure on his body was released quickly.

Chitrasen bent down, his torso facing the floor but his eyes on the walls of the building. Slowly he released one hand, and Khetri responded by immediately clutchingthe wall with the free hand. “Then I knew he was safe, and let go of the second hand too, after moving back a bit,” he said.

Khetru went in, his arms paining intensely from the near-fifteen minute brush with death, and his legs wounded by the glass pieces. He was safe.

Chitrasen sat down, resting his aching body against the wall, and waited for the fire rescue team to open the flat above and pull him over. The ordeal was over by 10.45 am, nearly 20 minutes after the scaffolding gave way.