‘Exposure to gas fumes from garbage dump led to students falling ill’

the management on Saturday said exposure to gas fumes from a garbage dump adjacent to the college compound wall led to the incident.

Hyderabad: A day after students of Kasturba Gandhi Junior College for Women, Secunderabad, reported sudden suffocation, breathlessness and nausea, the management on Saturday said exposure to gas fumes from a garbage dump adjacent to the college compound wall led to the incident.

According to the college management, students in classrooms 204 and 205 observed a pungent smell wafting from the window and closed it down. On being informed, the management immediately evacuated everyone from the building and alerted authorities concerned.

---

The police, clues team, fire and medical services conducted a complete inspection of the entire building including the CCTV footage. However, they did not find any cause for the pungent smell or lapse in the safety measures in the college, BP Chakravarthy, college correspondent said.

Later, it was identified that gas fumes were emanating from the outside the college premises from a garbage dump adjacent to the college compound wall, he said.

“The garbage cleaner noticed a bottle containing some chemical substance. The GHMC garbage remover who was clearing the garbage accidently broke the bottle that resulted in the gas emission. He and another garbage remover were exposed to the chemical fumes and both of them felt nausea and had vomiting. The fumes slowly spread into the classrooms adjacent to the compound wall and about 30 students of the colleges got exposed to the fumes causing nausea and dizziness,” Chakravarthy said.

Students were immediately rushed to nearby hospitals by the college staff and majority of them have already been discharged from the hospital. The remaining would be discharged on Saturday, Chakravarthy said.

The college management urged the authorities concerned to remove the garbage dump to ensure that similar incidents do not occur in the future.