MUMBAI: A fashion designing student, Aanchal Arora, died of cardiac arrest induced by suffocation at an overcrowded concert where American DJ Skrillex was playing at HUDA ground. The venue, which can accommodate around 5000 people, is said to have had more than its limit, which is why the disaster happened.
While Arora lost her life, a friend -Aashima, who accompanied her to the event, fell unconscious and was admitted to intensive care at a private hospital in New Delhi. However, she will soon be discharged.
The Arora family is in utter shock and cannot decide their future course of action. A family friend, Somesh Arora said, “At the moment, they are very distressed. Tomorrow is the cremation at Punjabi Bagh. They are very disturbed. The mother is still in shock with the incident. It is such a traumatic thing that they can’t even think of all these things (legal action) at the moment.” The family confirmed that they have no history of ailments, and have been in good shape.
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In a statement, DCP (East) Deepak Saharan said that the 23-year old girl is from Pitampura, Delhi, and daughter of Ashok Arora. He further added that she developed medical complications during the event and collapsed on the spot. She was later taken to Max Hospital in an ambulance provided by the show organisers, where she was declared dead.
Saharan added, “After post-mortem her viscera has been preserved by the doctor and the exact cause of death will be opined after the results are obtained from Forensic Science Laboratory. Meanwhile, the police have carried out 174 CrPC proceedings in the case.”
Not many at the event were aware that this tragedy had taken place during Skrillex’s performance. As per an attendee, during the gig, the DJ asked his fans to take care and not to push each other. The crowd apparently got out of hand after a while.
It was also heard that the VIP section of the event was very crowded.
Vh1 Supersonic Arcade, which brought Skrillex to India for his debut tour, has not yet issued any form of statement. However, the production of the event was given to Mumbai-based Clockwork Events, but there was misinformation that Scoop Brand Holdings Pvt. had carried out the production. When asked to comment on the same, Scoop Brand Holdings Pvt. Ltd CEO Abhishek Mehta said, “We had originally bid for the event, however, the organisers in their wisdom decided to go with another event production company, based out of Mumbai to organise the event. We had in fact made some bookings for the said event at another venue in Sector 29. However, we had nothing to do with the final event that took place on Sunday, 11 October, 2015.”
Commenting further about health and safety, Mehta said, “As a company, we pride ourselves for our health and safety records on these kinds of events.” He also stressed that the company has worked hard over the past years to produce hundreds of similar events.
Skrillex played in Bengaluru, Hyderabad and Mumbai, with New Delhi being the last gig on his India tour. HUDA Ground is a prominent location for events and concerts in the Delhi/NCR region and has hosted many artists.
