13/07/2025
Sumanlata, 21 and pregnant, last spoke to her husband Shailendra, an auto driver in Gurugram, at 8.19 pm on July 9. He told her he was dropping off a passenger and would be home soon. Around 9 pm, she called again. He didn’t answer. She kept calling, hundreds of times, but he never picked up.
Hours passed. Anxious, Sumanlata went to their landlord, Babulal, for help, who went to the police to report Shailendra missing.
The next morning, some delivery riders passing by found Shailendra’s body in an open sewer in Sector 47. That night, while trying to navigate a waterlogged street, his auto fell into the open manhole and overturned, throwing him inside.
Shailendra had moved to Gurugram from Kannauj five years ago. Here, he’d built a life in Sector 9, earning a steady income to support his family. A family shattered. A woman, likely without the qualifications for a stable job, left to fend for two kids on her own, all because the sarkari system couldn’t even cover an open manhole in time.
In a civilised country, his wife could sue the municipality for gross negligence and get millions in compensation to secure her and the children’s future, maybe even press for criminal negligence so the careless face jail. But in India, aap ek baal nahi ukhaad sakte, na sarkar ka, na sarkari aadmi ka.
