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Woman Falls off a Cliff in Gujarat While Taking a Selfie, Survives By Landing in Bushes

The lengths people go to for the gram.
Shamani Joshi
Mumbai, IN
Indian woman falls off cliff while clicking selfie, saved by landing on bush
Photo via Pexels

When it comes to death-by-selfie statistics—that of people having accidentally died in the pursuit of the perfect selfie—India has been on top of the list. A 48-year-old from the city of Nashik would have almost joined this ‘killfie’ list were it not for some bushes.

Earlier this week, Sushma Pagare was visiting the Satpura hill station in the Dang district of Gujarat with her family. She was soaking in the breathtaking view at the ‘Sunrise Point’ on her holiday when she decided that she absolutely had to document that moment via her selfie cam. But it was all downhill from there, because in her quest to capture the perfect selfie, she accidentally slipped and fell off the cliff. Luckily, a clump of bushes below were able to break her fall and she managed to come out of it alive even though she was seriously injured in the incident.

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"She lost her balance while clicking a selfie apparently due to strong winds," a police official told PTI. Pagare was ultimately rescued by the police force with the help of locals and taken to the Saputara primary health centre before she was shifted to a private hospital in Nashik, the official added.

From a woman who died while clicking a selfie on a cliff in Matheran to another who was washed away by floods when she tried to squeeze in a photo at a flooded canal in Madhya Pradesh, ‘selficides’ or ‘killfies’ have claimed countless lives. And India happens to have the highest number of people who quite literally kill themselves for the perfect photo op.

While the concept of clicking selfies isn’t exactly the culprit, the fact that people go to all kinds of lengths to flex how they’re living their best life on social media definitely has a major role to play, and it’s important for Instagrammers to remember that safety should come before selfie. While India plans to have designated ‘no selfie-zones’ that warn tourists to avoid a front-cam fiasco, apps like ‘Saftie’ are also educating people about potentially dangerous situations to take selfies in. Because while a selfie may capture a moment for posterity in a carefully curated photo gallery, there’s really no point if the said captured moment is your last.

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