Owner booked for collapse of Thakurli building
Image credits_DNA
Last week July 28, 2015 after 13 hours of rescue operation, state authorities and NDRF team pulled out nine dead bodies, and rescued 15 people from the debris of a two-storey building, which is located in Thakurli and collapsed due to heavy rain.
According to recent reports, all 15 people who were rescued, excluding 10 injured people are treated at Shastrinagar civic hospital at Dombivli and in two other private hospitals. However; after the accident the Dombivli police registered a complaint as well as case against the building owners; Dropadabai Sakaram Patil as well as her two sons Sharad Sakaram Patil and Ramdas Sakaram Patil. The police stated that owners are absconding since the incident and in past they were repeatedly neglecting the notices from the KDMC (Kalyan Dombivli Municipal Corporation). Whereas; KDMC authorities stated that since 2009 we have declared that building as dangerous building and in last five years we have sent notice more than five times about the concern of building safety and they have also recommended to re-check the status of the building with skilled architects for repairing or demolish it. But every time owner neglected the notices, stated SB Shivarkar, who is senior police inspector associated with Dombivli police station.
All the three owners have been booked under Section 338 for causing grievous hurt by act endangering life or personal safety of others, Section 34 for common intention and Section 304 for punishment for culpable homicide not amounting to murder of Indian penal code. Meanwhile the team of NDRF (National Disaster Rescue Force) and team of KDMC (Kalyan-Dombivli Municipal Corporation) jointly conducted the rescue operation, however; as per the statement of Sudhakar Kulkarni, fire officer at KMDC, “At 1 PM we have ended the rescue operation and later again we have started the demolishing the rest of the building”. Constructed in 1972, more than 25 families were living in Matrukrupa building as there were 26 flats in the building, out of which 16 collapsed on Tuesday night. Before five years, building was declared unsafe and from past many years KDMC has been sending notices to the owners to vacate it, but always they refused to do same.
Hirday Narayan Yadav, 45 years old resident of building had a very narrow escape with his family. He stated that we lived at ground floor and just before collapse, I saw windows and doors are shaking and I immediately asked my family members to vacate the place, however; I have also alerted others. And as soon as we ran out from building, the staircase collapsed and other people stuck on the building’s Ist and IInd floor. According to Ishwaran, another resident of building, “Me and my daughter rescued, but my husband could not be saved”. After the end of rescue operation, immediately, KDMC began demolishing the building, however; there were group of people who were protesting by saying that they didn’t get opportunity to collect their belongings, we will not stop you from demolishing, but first let-us collect our belongings, which is pretty essential for us”.
Apart from that the pother people who were living nearby, also asked to vacate their flats because of safety reasons, however; the Vinayak Pandey, KDMC ward officer stated that Its essential for us to demolish the entire building because of safety reasons”. However; Kiran Surose, Kalyan tehsildar added that we have sent a proposal to chief minister Devendra Fadnavis to provide compensation to the victims.
