GURUGRAM: Girish and Swati, and their daughter Anjni, were as happy as any family can be before fate cruelly intervened early on Monday morning. Swati Garg (33) died as she tried to help others escape from a blaze that broke out in Tulip Orange society on Monday.The couple had shifted to the Sector 70 residential complex at the end of April this year, to a flat on the fifth floor. “As we were only three of us in the city, we decided to move into a gated society where we wouldn’t have to worry about our daughter, four and a half years, going out,” said Girish (34). And while there were a few warning signs, the Gargs would ignore them.“For example, at times the elevators would suddenly stop,” he recounts. Girish opened up to TOI, reliving those desperate hours. “Why have they closed mumma in a box?” daughter Anjni keeps on asking. To which her father can only reply, “Mummy is not well, we are taking her to a doctor.”Swati, he recalled fondly, was creative and loved colours. She would make sketches of her dream house, how she wanted the drawing and dining rooms — and the photographs on the wall — to look. The two had met through common friends, 10 years back in Sheopur , Madhya Pradesh. Swati was a Maharashtrian Brahmin, and Girish came from a Bania family.“In my family, no inter-caste marriage had happened (but) it didn’t take long for us to convince our family members. Her family was open-minded (and) believed in love marriage.” His family, too, came around, and in February 2010 they tied the knot in Gurugram, to where Girish had moved in 2005 after getting a job with IBM.The day Girish’s life changed began like any normal Sunday. “As it was a Sunday, we got up late, around 9 am. I took my daughter downstairs. That day, my wife and our neighbour had decided to make food together,” recalled Girish. Swati’s mother was also in town, having arrived some three weeks back, so the Gargs decided to have a small get-together in the evening. They called friends over, as well as Girish’s brother-in-law, who works in Gurugram“My wife made a mixed-vegetable dish, kadhi and poori. She gave the food to each family member on the floor. After all the friends had left, one of my friends, Rohit, stayed back as he lives in Delhi.”Girish, Swati and Rohit were chatting till 11.30 pm when they turned in for the day. They had little inkling of the horrors to come. “Around 2.15 am, when the power went, my wife could not sleep without AC and she was the first one who woke up. She asked me to see what was happening as we could hear loud sounds coming from outside,” he described.Swati, curious, got out of bed and went to the balcony to see. “She saw smoke coming from downstairs and that’s when she alerted me that a fire had broken out in our tower. As we gathered everyone in our house, we came out and heard glass breaking and all sorts of weird sounds. Swati told me she would go and wake everyone up as this seems to be nearby. “She knocked and woke up at least two families on the same floor. She went upstairs and woke a few families there, came back and said let’s go downstairs. So, all five of us took the stairs. I held my daughter and was in front, while Swati held her mother’s hand and was behind me, and Rohit (came) after her. We managed to reach the 3rd floor but the smoke was so much that I was not able to move further. All of us decided to go back.”Back inside, Swati warned Girish about the cylinder in the kitchen. “I panicked, thinking that things might blow up. She was much better than me during such situations. When we climbed up, I reached the 8th floor with my daughter and took shelter in one of the apartments there. I thought my wife would also come behind me but she did not,” Girish continued.Swati had reached the 10th floor, where the terrace is. Rohit climbed up towards where she was and shouted for her but got no reply. He entered a flat on the 9th floor. Girish would later make his way back in search of Swati. “I found the fire had not reached my flat and everything was intact. “When I came back to the ground floor, I saw that Rohit’s condition was not good. I went upstairs with some firefighters to look for my wife. There was a fireman on the 8th floor I saw him carrying my wife. I knew I had lost Swati when I was with her in the ambulance, she was not moving.”Girish’s mother-in-law was stranded between the 5th and 6th floors. “After around 45 minutes, we came down and I saw her gasping for breath.”She is now on a ventilator in a private hospital, and her condition is critical. “Her mind is blocked and both her lungs are not working. She suffered a cardiac arrest and has gone into a coma,” added Girish.

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