The broken part (circled in red) of the gallery of Balasore Zilla School and (inset) an injured student. Telegraph pictures

Balasore, Aug. 25: Four students sustained injuries in this district headquarters township today when a portion of a dilapidated gallery on their school playground caved in.

The gallery was set six feet above the ground. The damaged part of the gallery had neither been barricaded nor was ever a warning sign put up there declaring the structure as unsafe.

The injured students, all of whom were studying in Class VIII at Balasore Zilla School, were rushed to the district headquarters hospital, about 500 metres away.

However, they were all discharged after primary treatment. The injured students are Narottam Das, Ritesh Das, Dibyajyoti Pattnaik and Hitesh Kundu.

The incident occurred in the morning when the students were climbing up the gallery to fetch a ball during a football match.

“We climbed the gallery as the ball went there while we were playing. We had never thought the structure would collapse,” said an injured student. The gallery was constructed some 40 years ago.

The headmaster of the school, Arata Mantry, said the students had earlier been asked not to step onto the weak portion of the gallery.

The match was going on under the supervision of two teachers.

“The gallery is about 40-year-old and part of it has turned unsafe. Students are forbidden to use this dilapidated portion. We will request the roads and buildings department to demolish the unsafe structure,” said Manoj Nayak, president of the school’s parents-teachers’ association.

District inspector of schools, Balasore, Purna Chandra Sethi, who visited the injured students at the district headquarters hospital, said steps would be taken to prevent reoccurrence of such mishaps in future.