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CSMT FOB collapse: Civic engineers will move Bombay High Court against arrests

The union said assistant engineer Sandeep Kakulte and former executive engineer Anil Patil were being made scapegoats in the tragedy, despite the fact that the cause of the tragedy, in which six persons were killed and 31 were injured, has not yet been established.

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Barred from protesting with the Moral Code of Conduct in place, engineers from the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation have moved Bombay High Court against the arrest of two of their colleagues in connection with the Himalaya FOB collapse.

The union said assistant engineer Sandeep Kakulte and former executive engineer Anil Patil were being made scapegoats in the tragedy, despite the fact that the cause of the tragedy, in which six persons were killed and 31 were injured, has not yet been established.

"We have also written to the civic chief and requested him that if engineers are found guilty of dereliction of duty, they should be punished as per BMC laws," said Sainath Rajadhyaksha, executive president of BMC Engineers Union.

The union has also written to the municipal commissioner and requested him to prevent further action against Kakulte and Patil to keep employee morale high.

Furthering his argument, Rajadhyaksha also said that engineers were often mistreated by the civic body. "There is a report by a well-known audit firm that highlights the plight of engineers working with the BMC," he said, "It says they are overworked. The findings are five to six years old, but nothing has changed."

A preliminary report by Chief Engineer (Vigilance) on the tragedy had pinned culpability on the auditing firm DD Desai Consultants that inspected the bridge at Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus (CSMT) in 2016 and gave it a clean chit of structural health.

The two engineers from the Bridges department were found accountable as they had overseen the process and repairs. They were arrested, along with the director of the firm by the Azad Maidan Police.

However, on Thursday, Chief Engineer Sanjay Darade admitted to the Standing Committee that BMC had misread the audit report, which had in fact pointed out elements on the bridge that needed attention.

Rajadhyaksha said the union members will meet to decide the further course of action.

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