Taxi driver Sanjay Yadav, who had a lean Friday last week, jumped at his roommate’s offer to give a ride to a woman from Mulund, little did he know that he was about to witness yet another robbery that would etch itself in his memory and make him a social media star for his “Spiderman-like” reflexes.
She was going to Atal Setu to throw some holy icons into the sea. They arrived at around 7pm. Yadav stopped and told the woman to hurry, but his heart skipped a few beats as she climbed over the guardrail. The siren of a police patrol made him panic. And then she jumped. But Yadav’s hand was faster than gravity. Yadav’s hand shot through the barrier, grabbed her by the hair and held her until three policemen relieved him. “I don’t think I did anything extraordinary. Life is precious and you shouldn’t give it up so easily.”
The sharp edge of the barrier cut his hand, but he held on for 16 seconds until a traffic policeman grabbed the woman’s left wrist and eased some of the strain on his arm. A week later, Yadav is a hero in Mumbai and also in his distant homeland. Village Jharkhand“I have shared newspaper clippings with my family and they are very proud of me,” he says.
Hero without a cape
It was a normal day for 31-year-old taxi driver Yadav, who shares a 1,400 x 9,000 square foot room with four others in Thane. He put on his white driver’s shirt and left home at 9 am, not knowing that within 24 hours he would become a social media sensation. By 3 pm, Yadav had completed three or four trips and was sitting with a cup of chai when a roommate, also a taxi driver, rang him to pick up a female passenger as he already had a ride.
The 57-year-old woman lived in Mulund, not far from Thane, and wanted to head south to the sea bridge to immerse images of deities. “I picked her up from Mulund at around 5.30 pm,” recalls Yadav. “As soon as she was in the car, she said she wanted to go to Atal Setu to immerse images of deities. I told her we should go somewhere else as cars are not allowed to stop on the bridge, but she insisted. She said it would not take her more than five minutes.”
Long distance, short fuse
Yadav was driving from Mulund to Atal Setu via Airoli, chatting a bit on the way. “She asked me how I knew the other driver and I said we were roommates. Then she asked about my family… Everything seemed normal until my phone beeped. She covered both her ears and asked me to turn down the volume, even though it was not set too high anyway,” says Yadav. “What’s wrong?” he asked her, and she said she could not bear loud noises: “The volume that is normal for you is too loud for me.”
Not what he expected
It was 7 pm when they reached Atal Setu. The woman asked Yadav to stop the car as soon as possible. “She wanted me to park it at an angle so that no one could see what she was doing. I stopped near the Shelghar toll plaza exit and asked her to hurry up,” says Yadav. He assumed she had pictures and figurines of gods in her bag which she would just throw across the bridge, but he was startled when she climbed over the guard rail and started dropping them one by one. “I got out of the car and asked her what she was doing. I panicked because I was breaking the law by stopping on the bridge and she was taking a huge risk by climbing the wall,” says Yadav.
Rescue in a fraction of a second
The woman threw two pictures into the sea and continued to look around. Then, perhaps to distract Yadav, she asked him for some water to sprinkle on the pictures. “I kept telling her to hurry up, but she was persistent,” he says. The water bottle he had on the passenger side was empty. As he walked toward the other side of the car, he heard a patrol car speeding toward them, its siren blaring.
“We both heard the siren and panicked. In the seconds that I looked away from her to look at the approaching van, the woman who had been sitting astride the wall swung her legs outwards. Then she jumped. And I reached out and grabbed her by the hair,” says Yadav.
Police come to the rescue
The police unit arrived just in time. Constables Lalit Amarshet, Kiran Mhatre and Yash Sonawane stopped just as the woman turned around and jumped off the bridge. They climbed over the railing and held her. It took more than a minute to get her to safety. They took her to Ulwe police station in Navi Mumbai and called her family.
According to police, the woman said she had no intention of jumping into the sea, but submerged the pictures as part of a ritual. “She claimed she panicked when she saw the police car and jumped,” an officer said.
Yadav did not get a chance to speak to her at the police station, but the police and her family thanked him for saving her life. “They (her family) held my hand and thanked me again and again. They said I was a ‘farishta’ (angel) to them,” Yadav says. After thanking Yadav, the police warned him never to stop on the bridge again. Yadav says if he gets a chance to speak to the woman, he will tell her not to give up hope. After all, it is hope that keeps him going in the big city, six years after he left Jharkhand to earn a living.
She was going to Atal Setu to throw some holy icons into the sea. They arrived at around 7pm. Yadav stopped and told the woman to hurry, but his heart skipped a few beats as she climbed over the guardrail. The siren of a police patrol made him panic. And then she jumped. But Yadav’s hand was faster than gravity. Yadav’s hand shot through the barrier, grabbed her by the hair and held her until three policemen relieved him. “I don’t think I did anything extraordinary. Life is precious and you shouldn’t give it up so easily.”
The sharp edge of the barrier cut his hand, but he held on for 16 seconds until a traffic policeman grabbed the woman’s left wrist and eased some of the strain on his arm. A week later, Yadav is a hero in Mumbai and also in his distant homeland. Village Jharkhand“I have shared newspaper clippings with my family and they are very proud of me,” he says.
Hero without a cape
It was a normal day for 31-year-old taxi driver Yadav, who shares a 1,400 x 9,000 square foot room with four others in Thane. He put on his white driver’s shirt and left home at 9 am, not knowing that within 24 hours he would become a social media sensation. By 3 pm, Yadav had completed three or four trips and was sitting with a cup of chai when a roommate, also a taxi driver, rang him to pick up a female passenger as he already had a ride.
The 57-year-old woman lived in Mulund, not far from Thane, and wanted to head south to the sea bridge to immerse images of deities. “I picked her up from Mulund at around 5.30 pm,” recalls Yadav. “As soon as she was in the car, she said she wanted to go to Atal Setu to immerse images of deities. I told her we should go somewhere else as cars are not allowed to stop on the bridge, but she insisted. She said it would not take her more than five minutes.”
Long distance, short fuse
Yadav was driving from Mulund to Atal Setu via Airoli, chatting a bit on the way. “She asked me how I knew the other driver and I said we were roommates. Then she asked about my family… Everything seemed normal until my phone beeped. She covered both her ears and asked me to turn down the volume, even though it was not set too high anyway,” says Yadav. “What’s wrong?” he asked her, and she said she could not bear loud noises: “The volume that is normal for you is too loud for me.”
Not what he expected
It was 7 pm when they reached Atal Setu. The woman asked Yadav to stop the car as soon as possible. “She wanted me to park it at an angle so that no one could see what she was doing. I stopped near the Shelghar toll plaza exit and asked her to hurry up,” says Yadav. He assumed she had pictures and figurines of gods in her bag which she would just throw across the bridge, but he was startled when she climbed over the guard rail and started dropping them one by one. “I got out of the car and asked her what she was doing. I panicked because I was breaking the law by stopping on the bridge and she was taking a huge risk by climbing the wall,” says Yadav.
Rescue in a fraction of a second
The woman threw two pictures into the sea and continued to look around. Then, perhaps to distract Yadav, she asked him for some water to sprinkle on the pictures. “I kept telling her to hurry up, but she was persistent,” he says. The water bottle he had on the passenger side was empty. As he walked toward the other side of the car, he heard a patrol car speeding toward them, its siren blaring.
“We both heard the siren and panicked. In the seconds that I looked away from her to look at the approaching van, the woman who had been sitting astride the wall swung her legs outwards. Then she jumped. And I reached out and grabbed her by the hair,” says Yadav.
Police come to the rescue
The police unit arrived just in time. Constables Lalit Amarshet, Kiran Mhatre and Yash Sonawane stopped just as the woman turned around and jumped off the bridge. They climbed over the railing and held her. It took more than a minute to get her to safety. They took her to Ulwe police station in Navi Mumbai and called her family.
According to police, the woman said she had no intention of jumping into the sea, but submerged the pictures as part of a ritual. “She claimed she panicked when she saw the police car and jumped,” an officer said.
Yadav did not get a chance to speak to her at the police station, but the police and her family thanked him for saving her life. “They (her family) held my hand and thanked me again and again. They said I was a ‘farishta’ (angel) to them,” Yadav says. After thanking Yadav, the police warned him never to stop on the bridge again. Yadav says if he gets a chance to speak to the woman, he will tell her not to give up hope. After all, it is hope that keeps him going in the big city, six years after he left Jharkhand to earn a living.
