Chennai Police begins probe in crane collapse at Kamal’s shooting

The city police on Friday launched a probe into the crane collapse incident during the shooting of Kamal Haasan-starrer Indian 2 on Wednesday night that killed three people by booking the production house and detaining the crane operator for questioning.

The incident sent shock waves across the state raising questions on safety compliance during film shooting. Though Lyca Productions, the production house, maintains that it followed all rules while deploying the crane for the shooting, several questions still remain unanswered.

Three people -- Krishna, an assistant director, and production assistants Madhu and Chandran – were killed and 10 others were injured when a crane used in the shooting at the EVP film city on the outskirts of the city collapsed on Wednesday evening.

Police on Friday booked Lyca Productions for the lapses and took the crane operator, Rajan, who was booked for negligent conduct with respect to machinery and causing death due to negligence. “The crane operator is being questioned on the incident that killed three people. We have launched our investigations into the incident,” a police officer said.

Besides, the police booked the production house for negligence.

After the incident, eyewitnesses and costume designer Amritha Ram took to Twitter to narrate the horrific accident. They said the film’s crew including Kamal Haasan, Shankar and Agarwal were at the spot when the incident took place and they escaped by a whisker.

Kamal Haasan had himself acknowledged that he could have been a victim of the unfortunate incident and stressed the need to take enough safety measures to ensure every person of the crew is protected from such accidents.

“I shouldn’t be telling this today. But I could have been in this room today (hospital where the injured were admitted). The director moved away from the spot four seconds and so was the cameraman. The heroine and I were standing inside the structure. If I had moved two inches here or there, someone else would have been speaking to you here,” the actor had said on Thursday.