Three children trapped under debris rescued; seepage had weakened iron rods holding roof of 20-year-old house
Two of a family died while three were injured after the roof of their house collapsed on them in the intervening night of Sunday and Monday in Dwarka's Hari Vihar area. Officials said that these colonies are unauthorised.
According to the police, a call was received around 1 am about a roof collapse in the Hari Vihar area near Kakrola dairy. The family of five --- a couple and three children had been staying in the house since 1998. While the couple died, the children were saved. The deceased have been identified as Sunil (40), Rachna (40). Their children Vaibhav (19), Gulshan (16) and Gungun (9) are stable. Only Gungun has sustained a fracture on her leg. Sunil worked at a shoe factory in the Outer Delhi area.
According to neighbours, the power supply went off around midnight and most of the residents were awake. The neighbours heard a loud noise and stepped out to see the roof of the house collapsed. Since there was no electricity, the residents turned on the flashlights on their phone and started the rescue operation. In the meantime, the police officials and the disaster management officials arrived at the site.
The rescue operations paced up and the bodies were recovered. While the parents were sleeping on the bed, the children were sleeping on the ground. The parents were covered with the debris, most of which fell on them. Vaibhav who was sleeping close to the wall was saved and received minor scratches.
As per Vaibhav, the house was owned by his father and he was born in the same house. The t-iron used to hold the weight of the roof become weak with time because of water seepage. As per officials these are unauthorised colonies and the house in question was built around 20 years ago but the roofs of most houses in the are are temporary.
"We all came out after hearing the loud noise and saw the roof of the house had collapsed. My children went to help and tried to pull them out but there was no light and we were able to get the eldest son Vaibhav out. The police officials later arrived with huge torches which paced up the work," said Nisha, a neighbour and one of the first to reach the house.
"We live in Etah and got to know about the incident through a police officer around 2 am. We rushed here as soon as possible. We can't believe my brother and his wife are no more. It is a very difficult time for us but we have to be strong for their children who have just lost their parents," said Satpal Singh Chauhan, Sunil's brother.
"They had also put a layer of bricks on the roof to stop the leakage of water. The weak T-iron rods were unable to take the load of the roof, hence collapsed. The body was handed over to the family after the post-mortem," said Anto Alphonse, DCP, Dwarka district.
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 "Dwarka house collapse")
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