All that is left in Pakmodia street building collapse site on Friday. (Express photo by Nirmal Harindran)
In A narrow, one-room madrasa on Pakmodia Street lies an assortment of household items —photoframes, clothes, utensils, broken chests of drawers, retrieved from the rubble where the Husaini building stood till Thursday. Two women — relatives of the Lightwala family — fight back tears as they rummage through the items. The Lightwala family lost eight members in the collapse. The family’s patriarch, Quresh Lightwala (60) is the only survivor. Quresh’s two sons Ibrahim (22) and Murtuza (32), his daughter-in-law Sakina (28), pregnant daughter Alfiya Mandsorawala (25) as well as his three grandchildren lost their lives in the collapse.
“This was Murtaza’s wedding dress,” one of the women exclaims as she opens a suitcase to reveal a white outfit. “We got a call that we have to come and collect some belongings of the family. It is devastating for us. Please pray for us,” she says.
Distant relatives of families who stayed in the building arrived at the tragedy site on Saturday to pick up belongings, said Amin Patel, local Congress legislator. Ten-year-old Zainab Chashmawala, one of the two survivors in the Chashmawala family, has been taken in by her relatives who live nearby. Her grandmother Tasneem is still in intensive care at Saifee Hospital, where three injured people were shifted.
“She had a big head injury. Suturing was done to stop bleeding. Thankfully, there is no internal brain injury,” a hospital official said. The condition of two others, Quresh Lightwala and Juzer Arsiwala, is stable.
According to doctors at J J Hospital, six injured remain admitted in the hospital. “All of them are stable. We have conducted eight minor surgeries. On Friday, a few patients were discharged,” a doctor said. In J J Hospital, most of those admitted are labourers who survived.
With rescue operations called off, the collapse site wore a desolate look on Saturday morning. Residents and shopkeepers along the stretch leading to the collapse site said the horror of the incident was yet to sink in. Bakri Eid celebrations, too, were hit. A condolence meeting was held on Friday evening as members of the Dawoodi Bohra community in the area came together to pray for those affected by the tragedy.
A spokesperson of the Saifee Burhani Upliftment Trust (SBUT) said some families from nearby areas had approached them and expressed willingness to move to a transit facility at Sion. Patel, too, said families from Rasool Manzil located opposite Husaini building, stood have approached him for moving out. “Many don’t want to move to transit facilities in far-off areas,” he said.
