With Selfie Sticks In Hand, People Gather At Kolkata's Bridge Collapse Site To Get Perfect Shot

Armed with cellphones, selfie sticks and digital cameras, Kolkatans gathered at the collapsed Majerhat bridge site on Wednesday, triggering sick memories of disaster tourism that the city had witnessed after the Vivekananda Road flyover collapse and the Robinson Street skeleton tragedy.

Businessman Prabhat Naskar, in his fifties, was among the firsts in the crowd of around 100 who were at the northern end of the barricade put up by the police near the collapsed bridge. Wearing a helmet and holding his cellphone high up in the air, he clicked several photographs of the site.

¡°I had crossed this bridge on Tuesday around 4.30pm and after 20 minutes it collapsed. I thanked my luck yesterday and today I came all the way from Sarsuna ¡ª taking a detour ¡ª to click a photograph of the collapsed portion. I will show it to my daughter,¡± said Naskar.

Friends and colleagues Ranadeep Mitra and Jumman Rahmam, who work at a car showroom in Mominpore, took a break from their work around 12.30pm and came down to get a closer look at the collapsed bridge.

TOI

¡°Such scenes can only be seen in movies. I have never seen a disaster site from up close. So I didn¡¯t want to waste the opportunity,¡± said Mitra, a resident of Behala Parnasree.

College students Rajveer Singh and Prakash Yadav were found filming the collapsed site, the rescue operations and also taking sound bytes from some of the officials present there. ¡°We have a college project due and with the bridge falling down, we took it as an opportunity to make a small film on the disaster and the rescue operations. So far, we have got some really good visuals, but it would have been nicer if we been able to get a little closer to the site,¡± said Singh.

TOI

At the site, TOI spotted several persons using selfie sticks and even one making a video call. ¡°My sister stays in Bangalore and she wanted to see how the place looks now. So I called her on WhatsApp. I had to park my bike almost a kilometre away,¡± he said, unwilling to be named.

Even those who were travelling in trains crowded near the windows and the doors with their cameras switched on when they passed Majerhat station.