One person died and another was severely injured when a five-storey building collapsed around 7:55am on Saturday in Mumbra. The tragedy, in fact, could have been bigger, had 150 residents not vacated its premises on time. Out of the four tra who were suspected to have been trapped, two were rescued. The injured person has been admitted in a local hospital.
The deceased has been identified as Hanif Kazi and the injured is Sameera Kazi, 24.
The Banu Complex in Jeevanbaug had eight shops on the ground floor and 28 residential rooms. From early Saturday morning patches of cement were falling off its walls. “Since 7am, people started vacating their homes leaving their belongings behind. Around 7.55am, I heard a loud bang. The entire area became dusty for about half-an-hour after that,” said Farooq Shaikh, a shopkeeper from a neighbouring building. The Mumbra police have registered a case against four persons. Among them are the two builders, Mohammed Akil Shaikh, 63 and his son Shakil Shaikh, 41.
The two others are the landlords Hamida Banu Manzoor Khan and Farzana Iqbal.
Nadeem Siddique, brother of Mohammed Ansari who resided in the building, said, “In the past fortnight, the residents had four meetings with the builder regarding reconstruction of the building as it had developed cracks. But the builder asked them to pay him Rs1 lakh per flat to do the repairs. The foundation of the building was weak as the material used for its construction was not good enough.”
Thane Municipal Corporation (TMC) chief Aseem Gupta said: “Around 90% of the buildings in Mumbra are illegal. This too was an illegal structure.”
According to Gupta, all the TMC corporators met on Friday regarding the geological survey carried out across Thane city. “But only Mumbra was left out as the residents opposed it since they do not want to pay property tax. ”
Narrow lanes hinder rescue work
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