Six persons died and one more is fighting for life with burn injuries when a three-storeyed under-construction building collapsed on a two-storeyed structure adjacent to it, at Chairman Street in Kadiri town in the district, in the early hours of Saturday.
While the Fire Department and police pulled out six persons from the debris with the help of an earthmover, the NDRF team reached the town in the morning and rescued three others, and brought out bodies trapped under the debris.
The under-construction building had no pillars and was being built on an old ground floor house. The incessant rain for five days in the town led to the walls of the old building giving way and falling on the adjacent building at 2.45 a.m., which triggered an LPG cylinder blast, and that added to the magnitude of the accident, said Kadiri Circle Inspector Satyababu.
The owner of the under-construction building Firoza Bee, 65, too died in the mishap. The other deceased were identified as Saidunnisa, 2, Fariunnisa, 8 months, Banu, 30, Yashika, 3, and Fathima Bee, 65. Another person identified as Raju has been admited to hospital with 50% burns, which the police believe could be from the cylinder blast.
Bharatiya Janata Party State general secretary S. Vishnuvardhan Reddy visited the mishap site and demanded immediate action against the Municipal Town Planning officers for not checking the unauthorised construction. He demanded ₹50 lakh each to the deceased and ₹10 lakh to the nine persons injured.
Meanwhile, the strength of other buildings in the street and other areas in the town was being checked to bring out people from unsafe constructions. District Collector Nagamani Selvarajan and Superintendent of Police Fakkeerappa Kaginelli were monitoring the rescue operations from Anantapur.
