MUMBAI, August 11: ``I am sorry I can't offer you tea. The tea-vendor around here was the first to be crushed to death,'' says the PWD Executive Engineer (Thane) S V Tamkhede who is supervising the clearance work of the debris at Malshej ghat. A massive landslide on Sunday afternoon has left four persons seriously injured and disrupted traffic.

``The Otur police got information of the landslide at around 2.30 pm yesterday ,'' informs Tamkhede, who expects it to take five days for normalising the traffic flow.

``The police patrol saw mud and stones trickling down an over hang, and immediately swung into action warning picnickers to stay away. Considering the kind of crowds one sees here on Sundays, if it were not for the prompt action by the police, the number of casualties would have been higher,'' adds Tamkhede. While attempts are on to dislodge the huge boulders blocking the road, thick fog and heavy downpour are making operations difficult.

Located just near the Bogdeshwar temple, the debris measures nearly 60 m in length, 10 m in width and 12 m in height. ``Once we have dislodged the smaller boulders, we plan to blast the site from both the sides to clear way for road repairs.''

The deputy engineer-in-charge of the ghat section, Deepak Patil says the ghat is notorious for being landslide prone with at least two to three landslides every year. ``This is by far the worst one,'' he says, adding that there was another landslide on July 5 .

Tamkhedkar does not think any preventive work can be undertaken in this ``difficult geological terrain'', though he says recent studies have recommended that iron meshes be put up in areas where the rock surface is over hanging. ``This creates an imbalance in mass distribution and brings a lot of pressure on the outermost rock,'' he explains, adding ``Since the rocks already have cracks and crevices which run deep due to natural thermal expansion and contraction, large chunks of it gets loosened. Moreover, this region gets heavy rainfall which erodes the top soil holding the outer rocks in their place. It may thus require only a small rock to come loose to set off a landslide.''

Being the approach road to places like Junnar and Chakan, the Malshej ghat route saves a detour of around 50 kms. The presence of the industrially active MIDC zone near Murbad on the other side has further contributed to the traffic. However, the landslide has done little to deter the picnickers, who could be seen in sizeable numbers enjoying themselves at the natural waterfalls around the ghat. ``It is only the police bandobast which keeps us away from exploring the actual landslide site,'' says Dinesh Shah, who has driven with his family all the way from Thane.

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.