3-year-old Noida boy falls to death through railing of flat's balcony

Noida: A three-year-old boy died after slipping through widely spaced balcony railings and falling from the fourth floor of a flat in Barola village of Sector 49 on Saturday evening.

Siddharth Goswami was playing with his five-year-old sibling in their room when the incident occurred around 5pm on Saturday. While his father briefly stepped into the washroom and his mother was occupied with household chores in the kitchen, the toddler wandered onto the balcony.

Preliminary investigation revealed that the gap between the railings was wide enough for the child to slip through, leading to the fatal fall onto the Barola road below.

"After returning to the room, the father couldn't locate Siddharth but heard screams from outside. When he rushed to the balcony, he was horrified to find his son lying face down on the road below, oozing blood," a senior police official said.

The family, originally from Kasganj in UP and residents of Barola for the past five years, rushed Siddharth to a nearby private hospital, where doctors declared him dead on arrival. The child is survived by his parents, father Suraj Goswami, a power department lineman; his mother, a homemaker; and his two siblings — a four-month-old and a five-year-old.

Anup Kumar Saini, the SHO of Sector 49 police station, said no formal complaint had been filed yet. During questioning, the father told police that while Siddharth often played in the room connected to the balcony and occasionally ventured onto it, they never anticipated the possibility of him slipping through the railings.

Police said they had sent the body for an autopsy and were awaiting the results.

The incident sparked discussions about the need for stricter safety regulations in residential buildings, particularly concerning balcony designs in high rises.

"We have seen several such accidents in Noida in the past. It's high time that authorities increase the height of balconies in apartments and ensure there are no wide gaps between them," a resident said.