Two panels of the ceiling at National College Metro Station collapsed along with a brick

BENGALURU: A part of the false ceiling at National College Metro station on Green Line collapsed on Monday night. Four passengers had a narrow escape as they were only a few feet away from the spot.

A video circulating on social media on Wednesday revealed that a few panels of the false ceiling got dislocated and two of them collapsed along with a brick.

The ceiling fell near the rear end of the automatic fare collection (AFC) gates at 6:03pm when four passengers, including three women, were walking through the adjacent gate. Luckily, none of the commuters was injured despite a brick landing too close to one of them. The fallen brick damaged one of the gates at the station.

BMRCL managing director Ajay Seth said: “One of the bricks in the 70cm-high wall constructed between the platform deck and track bed got loosened and fell on the false ceiling. The track side has plastering while the platform side doesn’t have it due to less access. Therefore, the brick got loose and collapsed due to vibration caused by train movement.”

“The wall is not part of any structural part and hence there is no issue regarding safety to the structure. To prevent such occurrence in future, the un-plastered side has been covered by mild steel sheet permanently. Other stations are also being checked for preventive measures,” he added.

BMRCL has been in the news for wrong reasons for a while: leaking stations during rain, honeycomb formation on concrete and damages to bearings among other things. In October 2017, a similar incident of false ceiling collapse had been reported at KR Market station, also on the Green Line.

BMRCL Employees’ Union vice-president Suryanarayana Murthy lamented that the safety of passengers travelling in the Metro has been compromised.

“We’re regularly highlighting the poor quality of civil and other works, but no action has been initiated against the contractors or staff concerned so far. A thorough probe by an external agency should be initiated to safeguard the interests of the travelling public. BMRCL is turning a blind eye to the complaints,” he said.

