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Broken lift, dead helpline: Wheelchair user stranded at Mumbai Metro station told to ‘walk home’, netizens outraged

The incident came to light after Mumbai-based comedian Karn Shah shared a video on Instagram, documenting what he called “one of the most horrific nights” he has ever experienced.

3 min readNew DelhiJan 16, 2026 12:09 PM IST

wheelchair man Mumbai Worli station lift broken

The situation became even more distressing when emergency support failed entirely

A late-night trip on the Mumbai Metro turned into a frightening ordeal for a wheelchair user after a broken lift at Worli station left him completely stranded, sparking renewed anger over how inaccessible even “modern” public infrastructure remains.

The incident came to light after Mumbai-based comedian Karn Shah shared a video on Instagram, documenting what he called “one of the most horrific nights” he has ever experienced. As he explains in the clip, the fear was not because of his disability, but because every system that was supposed to support him simply stopped working.

According to Shah, the only lift at Worli Metro station was out of order, leaving him stuck for more than 45 minutes with no safe exit. “So I’m at the Worli metro station and the lift is not working over here and it’s been over 45 minutes that I have been standing over here,” he says in the video. When he asked for help, the response shocked him — he was told to “walk home”.

Turning the camera towards fast-moving traffic, Shah says, “You can see how the main road is. It is busy and they expect me to go from this road all the way to the other from Worli.” The visuals show cars, buses and bikes speeding past, underlining how dangerous and impractical the suggestion was for someone in a wheelchair.

The situation became even more distressing when emergency support failed entirely. Shah says he tried calling the helpline several times, but “it rings for two seconds and the call automatically disconnects.” With no staff assistance, no working lift, and no accessible washroom – despite urgently needing one – he was left alone on a busy road late at night.

Watch the video:

Shocking Incident! Disabled Mumbai man in wheelchair gets stuck at Worli metro station after lift malfunctions, says the only response was, ‘Paidal ghar jao’. pic.twitter.com/OG97PEp690

— The Tatva (@thetatvaindia) January 15, 2026

The video has since gone viral, prompting a wave of outrage online. Many users slammed the authorities for treating accessibility as a box-ticking exercise rather than something people can actually rely on in real life.

“This is just terrible. This needs to be fixed. Thank you for raising this and so sorry you had to go through this,” one user wrote. Another commented, “Your hands were shivering. Oh dear I cried watching this, I know how lonely you would have felt.” A third added, “Sorry you have to go through this bro… Hope this country wakes up to accessibility and value life.”

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One comment summed up the public anger: “The cruelty of telling someone in a wheelchair to ‘walk home’ is genuinely dystopian. We can build fancy metro stations but can’t maintain basic accessibility infrastructure or train staff to have basic human decency.”