BMC to sue Mumbai fund manager who hit out at the civic body after nearly drowning by falling into an open manhole, says incident was on private property

Saved by quick reflexes, Mumbai fund manager Samir Arora may now be facing a defamation suit against him and some of his friends for maligning the Brihanmumbai  Municipal Corporation (BMC), after falling into an open manhole in Lower Parel on April 25.

Samir Arora, the founder of Singapore-based firm Helios Capital, fell into an uncovered manhole outside the office of Phoenix Mills located at Shree Laxmi Woolen Mills Estate, R.R Hosiery Building, Off Dr E. Moses Road, Mahalaxmi, Mumbai as tweeted by Arora. He has also shared more details of the incident tweeting that as he fell into the open manhole, he was sucked into chest-deep water. Acting quickly, he had held onto both sides of manhole and was helped by passersby who came to his rescue and helped him out.

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Following his rescue, Samir Arora took a jibe at BMC tweeting that if the civic body found his phone which had fallen into the drain where he almost drowned, they could keep it.

The incident was first shared by the fund manager's friend Neeraj Batra, who had later deleted the tweet which read: “Public should throw some of these BMC guys down these open manholes.” Soon some other Twitter users piled on his criticism, complaining about the BMC's inadequacy in preventing manhole cover thefts.

 
Feeling the heat of online criticism, BMC clarified that the manhole was located on private premises and not under the jurisdiction of the BMC, as per reports. It had then issued a notice to the private society for not barricading the area under construction work where the manhole was present.

Currently, the BMC is planning to file a defamation suit against and a few others for allegedly criticizing the civic body and attempting to 'malign its image'.

Reacting to this development Arora has tweeted sarcastically, " This is to put on record that BMC is the best municipal corporation in the world. We are all very proud of BMC. I hope all Mumbaikars will join me in applauding the services delivered by this very great organization."