A man succumbed to his injury on the spot when a tree fell on him at Jogeshwari (E) in Western Mumbai on Wednesday, while two others suffered grievous injury in a similar incident in Khar.

One Santosh Pande (32) had stopped his motorbike to reply his cell phone when the tree fell on him, killing him instantly. Pande a resident of Jogeshwari (E) stayed with his mother, wife and two children.  A sole breadwinner of his family, the deceased worked in a computer shop there.

After the tragic incident, the onlookers raised alarm and the crowd gathered there who informed the police. The police called Pande's relatives and friends. The people there, while questioning the BMC’s lackadaisical approach towards trimming trees said, "Police should probe if the civic body is at fault for not maintaining the tree."

The BMC makes payments of Rs 1 lakh to the family of those killed in tree collapses. "We will verify if the death is due to tree collapse," said a senior civic official. In the past one day, 53 trees were reported to have collapsed in Mumbai.