All Lift Users To Be Insured? What UP's Draft Bill Says

A month after eight workers died in an elevator crash in Greater Noida, the Uttar Pradesh government has finalised the draft of a bill making annual maintenance of elevators and insurance for their users mandatory.

The draft bill also makes registration of lifts a must and has provisions for penal action against agencies if there is any negligence in the upkeep of lifts.

A senior official in the government said the bill will be sent to the cabinet for approval. It is likely to be tabled in the Uttar Pradesh Assembly during the winter session and the law will be called the UP Lifts and Escalators Act, 2023, once it is passed and gets the governor's assent. 

Four workers were killed on the spot and another four had died of their injuries after an elevator fell from the 14th floor of the under-construction tower at an Amrapali Dream Valley project site in Greater Noida (West) on September 15. 

Barely three days ago, a lift in a Ghaziabad society went into a free fall with a woman and her three-year-old son in it. The lift fell from the eighth floor to the basement, but the mother and son escaped without injuries. 

In August, a 73-year-old woman had died of possible cardiac arrest after the cable of a lift in a Noida Sector 137 society snapped, leading to a free fall between floors. The lift did not hit the ground.