The deceased has been identified as Nabin Thakuri, 23, who hailed from Nuwakot district. Thakuri breathed his last soon after being taken to Nagarik Hospital, Gatthaghar for treatment. [break]His dead body has been taken to Tribhuvan University Teaching Hospital (TUTH), Maharajgunj for postmortem.
Thakuri was electrocuted when he tried to rescue other workers, who were working to replace old electricity poles along Sano Thimi-Pepsi Cola road, according to Metropolitan Police Circle of Madhyapur Thimi.
Of the six injured, four are from Sindhupalchowk and two from Kavre district. Ramesh Giri, 24, Shambhu Shakya, 23, Phurba Pakhrin, 18, Shyam Giri, 25, Aakash Lama Baiba, 18, hail from Sindhupalchok district, and Krishna Giri, 23, and Ramesh Dongh, 16, are from Kavre district. All of them are now undergoing treatment at Nagarik Hospital.
According to the police, the injured workers were employed by Card Engineering, a company that had won a contract from Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA) to replace old electricity poles in Madhyapur Thimi area, under a project aimed at upgrading the Kathmandu-Bhaktapur transmission lines.
"They (the injured workers) mishap occurred while toppling the old poles," said inspector Santosh Rimal, chief of Madhyapur Thimi Police Circle.
Kiran Banjade, chief of the Madhyapur Thimi branch of NEA, said Friday´s accident was a result of communication gap between the NEA and the contractor company.
"Electricity poles are replaced only during load-shedding hours," said Banjade. "We always inform the contractor about the load-shedding schedule of a particular area. But workers, by mistake, went to remove an electricity pole from where live cables were hanging."
The contractor could not be reached for comments.
The work of upgrading Kathmandu-Bhaktapur transmission lines has been suspended until the next notice.
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