In a ghastly replay of the 2013 Thane building collapse tragedy, a newly constructed six-storey building collapsed in Pune’s suburban region of Narhe-Ambegaon early Friday morning, killing a 28-year-old youth who was trapped under the debris.
Fortunately, the eight families living who had taken residence in the building rushed out to safety before the structure toppled over. The building, with five floors, 20 flats and a parking lot, was constructed barely a year ago.
National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) and fire brigade authorities recovered the body of Sandeep Mohite, who was trapped for more than 12 hours since the structure caved in.
According to eyewitnesses, Mr. Mohite, after courageously helping other residents out of the building, had himself rushed to the parking lot to salvage his four-wheeler.
“He saved everyone else, but could not make it himself. He died due to suffocation,” said Sandeep’s anguished mother.
“We heard a loud rumbling like an earthquake. There were cracks everywhere. We rushed out in the nick of time but lost all our belongings,” said a distraught resident who had moved in just three months ago with his family.
“The structure began crumbling between 3:05 a.m. and was reduced to rubble by 3:30 a.m. Apart from one person, the thirty-odd residents made it to safety. We are studying the building layout. Prima facie, the building appears to be a case of unauthorized construction,” said Additional Commissioner of Police Chandrashekhar Daithankar, speaking to The Hindu .
Police sources said that the builder, Kishore Vadgama, had been taken into custody.
Around 50 NDRF personnel have been pressed into service. Ambulance and fire brigade services were rushed to the site of the collapse.
Pune Mayor Dattatrey Dhankavade, of the Nationalist Congress Party, said that despite the building falling outside the Pune Municipal Corporation limits, an investigation would be launched into illegal structures that have mushroomed in the Narhe-Ambegaon Township.
He said that the erstwhile Congress- NCP government had sanctioned a staggering Rs. 8 crore to engineer residential buildings in 34 villages in and around Ambegaon.
Deputy Mayor and Congress leader Aba Bagul said that a “structure stability audit” of all buildings in the area, most of whom were given dubious sanction, would soon be carried out.
“It appears there was no proper evaluation of town planning in this area. Things like whether the floor space index (FSI) limit was fudged will be sternly looked into,” said Mr. Dhankavade, speaking to The Hindu.
In September 2012, six persons were killed on the spot and several injured after a four-storey residential building caved in the city’s Sahakar Nagar area.
In December that same year, 13 labourers were killed when a slab of an under-construction building collapsed at Wagholi, 20 km from Pune.