CHENNAI: “I called him for dinner, but he said he would come back after serving juice to director Shankar. Within minutes, I heard a loud sound,” said Mahendran, brother of Madhusudhanan Rao, who died after a crane fell on him at EVP film city in Chennai on Wednesday. Mahendran had also been working at the same film sets that night and recalls the incident frame-by-frame. “I immediately rushed back in, but couldn’t see anything because of the darkness. Suddenly, I heard his phone ring next to me, and I found him under the crane,” he said unable to withhold tears as he waited outside the mortuary at Kilpauk hospital.
Madhusudhanan had been in the industry for over eight years now, and was working as a production assistant. Both of them had returned to work a fortnight ago from Andhra Pradesh. He is survived by his mother, father, two sisters and younger brother. There were about 850 people at the sets, and around 500 had gone for dinner, said Mahendran. Around 30 to 40, including director Shankar and actor Kamal Haasan, were at the spot, he recalled. Madhusudhanan was just entering the tent where the crew sits when the crane came crashing on him.
Speaking to Express, a relative of Ramachandran alias ‘Vesti’ Ramachandran said, “He has been in the industry for over 30 years now. On Wednesday, he left home around 3 pm, and around 10.40 we received a call from the set about the mishap,” said the relative, adding that there was no safety measures for technicians on sets. He is survived by his wife and a daughter. The other deceased, Sai Krishnan, was the son-in-law of popular cartoonist, Madhan. He worked as an assistant director. Meanwhile, Nazarathpet police have registered a case against the crane operator, Rajan under IPC sections 287 (negligent conduct with respect to machinery) and 304A (death due to negligence), and launched a hunt for him. Rajan had fled the scene after the crash.