Five persons died and several others were injured when a structure built to lay a slab for an under-construction building collapsed late on Thursday night. THE PUNE Municipal Corporation (PMC) has appointed a 10-member committee under the district collector to inquire into the collapse of a slab structure in Yerawada’s Shastri Nagar that led to the death of five labourers and injured at least four more.
“Prima facie it looks that there was a failure in foundation raft for the construction work. According to the Unified Development Control and Promotion Regulations (UDCPR) 2020, there is a provision to set up an enquiry committee. Thus, a 10-member fact-finding committee under District Collector Rajesh Deshmukh has been constituted,” Municipal Commissioner Vikram Kumar said.
The committee has to submit its preliminary report to the state government within three days and a final report within 10 days, he said, adding that it has to scrutinise the documents and also take down their statement regarding the incident. The committee includes representatives from the Police Department, Town Planning Department, Public Works Department, Chief Fire Officer, Labour welfare office, Structural Engineer, an Architect, CREDAI and a Superintendent Engineer of PMC.
The municipal commissioner said that the PMC has also asked the College of Engineering Pune (CoEP) to study the technical aspect related to the project. The Municipal Commissioner and Pune Police Commissioner visited the accident site on Friday.
Local corporator and RPI(A) leader Siddarth Dhende alleged that there are many violations at the construction site where the accident took place. “The private developer, contractor, site engineer and the PMC engineer in-charge of the area should be held responsible for the incident,” he said, adding the RPI(A) demands compensation of Rs 25 lakh each to the family of the deceased.
Deputy Chief Minister Ajit Pawar urged the district administration to enquire into the incident and decide on steps to avoid a repeat of such incidents. He said that the state government would pay compensation of Rs 5 lakh each to the family of the deceased.
Pune Collector Rajesh Deshmukh said, “I have asked the fact-finding committee to expedite the process of inquiry. The Pune police and Labour Commissioner’s Office coordinated the process of sending the mortals remains of the deceased totheir homes.”
Nahid Alam, one of the construction workers at the site and who also is a complainant in the case, said that the bodies were scheduled to be taken to their hometowns post-midnight on Friday. “The relatives are satisfied with the promises made by the state government to give financial aid of Rs 5 lakh. We have made arrangements to take the bodies home,” said Nahid.
Meanwhile, Pune Police have booked several people linked with the construction of the building where a slab collapse incident killed five workers and injured four others. Pune Police Commissioner Amitabh Gupta said three people have been detained for questioning.
Mohammad Nahid Mohammad Master (21), a construction worker, filed a FIR under Sections 304 (culpable homicide not amounting to murder), 336 (endangering human life by acting negligently), 337 and 338 of the Indian Penal Code. Among those booked are Bluegrass Business Park’s construction contractor, Ahluwalia Contractor Private Limited’s Mohan Achalkar, several other unnamed staff of the firm; MCPL’s labour supervisor identified as Sharif and CNW’s supervisor Satish.
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