GHAZIABAD: The
Ghaziabad Development Authority has said almost the entire
colony where the under-construction building collapsed is unauthorised, with none of the houses having a layout plan approved by the agency.
“The buildings here have not been approved by any agency. No such clearances are ever taken. Construction work on this building had been going on for at least two years,” GDA chief engineer VN Singh said.
In Greater Noida’s Shahberi, too, where the twin building collapse killed nine persons last week, the developers had not bothered to take the Authority’s approval for the layout plan. In fact, almost all buildings in the village have been built bypassing the basic rule of getting the plan approved. Getting the layout approved by a government agency is mandatory for constructing a building on a notified plot.
Police said the labourers who had been working at the building in Radhey Krishna Colony were from Madhya Pradesh and Bihar. The workers would stay with their families in the building itself and the female members also paired up as labourers.
The three persons who have been referred to GTB Hospital in Delhi have been identified as Gulab Rani (47), her 8-year-old son Devendra, and Shiva, a five-year-old boy. Shiva’s parents, Rajkumar (30) and Geeta (27), have been admitted to a government hospital in Ghaziabad. Another worker, Raees (29), has been admitted there.
“There were around eight to nine workers at the construction site when the building collapsed. When I regained consciousness, I found I was at the hospital. My wife and I have no idea about the condition of our son. We have been working at the site for the past two months. Our salary for the first month was cleared, but we got nothing thereafter. We had complained to the builder about cracks in pillars, but to no avail. I was transporting sand from the second to the fourth floor when the building came crashing down,” Rajkumar said from his hospital bed.
Residents of the colony corroborated Rajkumar’s claim that the building had developed cracks. “The building had been damaged even before it was complete. The developer had used sub-standard material to construct it. Most buildings in this colony are of poor quality. The builders have duped us. There is no drainage and no exit for rain water. Most of the buildings are hazardous,” said Ankit Chaudhary, a local.
Police have identified the four developers of the project as Prasanjeet, Sanjeev and Satish Tomar of Galand and Manoj Goyal of Bihar.
The labourers stayed with their families in the building itself
