NEW YORK (1010 WINS) — The Cherry Hill fountain in Central Park wasn't surrounded by its usual crowd of horse-drawn carriages on Monday, rather a group of people dressed in black and holding white flowers for Romanch Mahajan, the 18-year-old tourist from India who died when he and his family were thrown from a carriage last week.
New York City Council Member Christopher Marte—who introduced legislation that would ban the horse-drawn carriage industry earlier this month—attended the vigil and read a statement from the Mahajan family, directly addressing Mayor Zohran Mamdani and asking for his intervention.
"This was not an unpredictable accident. It was a direct result of a severe safety violation and systemic failure to protect tourists," Marte read. "No family should ever travel to New York City and return mourning."
The family has asked for a memorial to be placed in the park in honor of Mahajan's life, which Central Park Conservancy Vice President David Saltonstall acknowledged as "a conversation we look forward to having with the family when they're ready."
TWU Local 100, representing the carriage horse drivers, placed a three-day pause on all operations following the death and condemned the actions of the driver, who at the time of the incident had stepped away from the carriage to take a photo of the family.
The organization has laid out a list of new training regulations for their drivers, and has made asks of the City, which was criticized at the vigil by executive director of the animal rights group NYCLASS (New Yorkers for Clean, Livable, and Safe Streets), Edita Birnkrant.
"By the union's own admission several days ago, they cannot operate safely," she said. "They have a host of demands for the city to somehow prevent another 2,000-pound horse from spooking. No amount of regulation or reform can prevent the next horse from spooking and killing someone."
Marte's legislation was first introduced as "Ryder's Law" by former Council Member Bob Holden after the death of carriage horse Ryder in 2022, but will be renamed "Romanch’s Law" in memory of the teen. NYC Council Speaker Julie Menin has already agreed to hold a hearing regarding the matter on July 15.
