A horror unfolded at a coaching centre in Delhi on Saturday. Several UPSC students were trapped in a waterlogged basement, which was made into a library. Three lost their lives.

Many students rushed out of the basement of Rau’s IAS Study Circle in west Delhi’s Rajendra Nagar, as water gushed into it. A video shows them wading through the water. The road in front of the coaching centre was flooded after heavy rains. A broken drain only added to the waterlogging. Locals blame the poor drainage system in the area for the tragedy.

While many students had a narrow escape,
three were trapped. Their bodies were recovered after a seven-hour rescue operation. The civil services aspirants were identified as Shreya Yadav (25), Tanya Soni, and Navin Delvin (28).

Their parents and family struggle to cope with grief.

Shreya Yadav: The girl with big dreams

Shreya was from Barsawa Hashimpur village in Ambedkar Nagar, Uttar Pradesh, and she was living with her uncle Dharmendra in Ghaziabad. She is the second of the three children; her father, Rajendra, runs a dairy centre.

Shreya earned a BSc degree from a college in Sultanpur and joined the coaching institute this year. She was preparing for the IAS entrance, which would have been her first attempt.

The family describes Shreya as a girl full of inspiration, who dreamed big and was passionate about becoming an IAS officer. Her older brother Abhishek was confident she would clear the UPSC examination as she had an impressive academic record. “My father took a bank loan to pay her fees,” he told The Indian Express.

Shreya’s father said that she had informed the family in the past about the basements getting flooded after rain. However, the institute had done nothing to address the issue.

Shreya’s uncle Dharmendra will take the body back to the village. The last two days have been dreadful. He was not informed of the flooding or the deaths by the coaching centre or the administration. He saw the news and rushed to the Ram Manohar Lohia Hospital.

“I saw the news and reached here. I went to the mortuary and asked them to show me the face for identification but they denied saying it was a police case. They showed me a paper where her (Shreya Yadav) name was written…,” he told news agency ANI.

“When the news of students being deceased started coming up I called the coaching institute, as I was there with her at the time of her admission. They said we couldn’t tell the name but two casualties had happened… Those who have given birth only know the value of life and it shouldn’t be lost due to mismanagement. I demand that a case of culpable homicide should be lodged against the owner of the coaching institute,” he demanded.

Tanya Soni: It was her childhood dream to crack UPSC

Twenty-five-year-old Tania Soni grew up in Telangana, where her father was working. She graduated BA in political science from a college in the national capital. She studied at the coaching institute for the past month and stayed at a women’s hostel at Delhi University’s Maharaja Agrasen College.

“Tanya had completed her graduation in Delhi and was preparing for UPSC there. She had a lot of interest since her childhood (in cracking UPSC),” her father Vijay Kumar told the news agency PTI. He was on his way to Delhi to take his daughter’s body and would then return to their village in Bihar, where the last rites would be performed.

The family – Kumar, his wife, and their other daughter – was travelling on a train to Lucknow when they received the news of Tanya’s death. “After getting information (about Tanya’s death) we got down at Nagpur and took a flight to Delhi,” he said.

Kumar worked with Singareni Collieries Company Ltd (SCCL) in Telangana for the past 25 years. He is presently a deputy general manager in SCCL and the family is settled in Mancherial.

“Tanya had big dreams and was highly motivated… She used to call home every day,” her father recalled.

Navin Delvin: A brilliant student

Navin Delvin was pursuing his PhD from Delhi’s prestigious Jawaharlal Nehru University in visual studies. His family lives in Malayattoor, Kerala’s Ernakulam district. They are originally from the Thiruvananthapuram district.

The 28-year-old had moved to Delhi eight months ago and was staying in Patel Nagar. One of his friends who was waiting to identify Navin’s body told The Indian Express, “We never knew he had enrolled for IAS coaching. We found out this morning.”

Navin’s mother Lancelet is a professor at Sanskrit University and she was returning home from church when she came to know about the tragedy. His father Suresh is a retired police officer and his younger an assistant professor at a local college.

Lancelet spoke to her son about the heavy rains in Delhi on Friday. While she knew he would be studying in the library for his PhD thesis on Saturday, she learned about the death on the next day. “Lancelet used to tell us that her Sunday prayers were meant for dedicating her son’s civil services dream to God,” a family friend Betty told The Indian Express.

Navin’s parents were admitted to a hospital after hearing about his death, as they complained of uneasiness.

Neighbours and relatives remember Navin as a brilliant student and researcher who aspired to be an IAS officer. Anna Joseph, a ward member, said the entire village was shocked after learning about the development. “Though we rarely met, the people living around have a very good opinion about them (Navin and his sister),” he was quoted as saying by The New Indian Express.

Student protests

Now the families of the three students are demanding justice. Several other youths are
protesting the deaths outside the coaching centre in Delhi. Many told News18 that the lives of students are not valued. They also claimed that several other students were missing from the area, a claim that authorities have dismissed.

The fear and anger is palpable. Any of them could have met a similar fate._With inputs from agencies_

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Delhi coaching centre deaths: The heartwrenching story of 3 UPSC aspirants with big dreams