A portion of the three-storey Saberi women’s hostel on Berhampur University campus collapsed on Thursday afternoon. All 104 boarders had a lucky escape as they were attending classes when the mishap occurred around 12.30 p.m. The part of the building that collapsed mainly comprised of toilets and balconies.
University registrar Ranjan Biswal said the building was declared unsafe after the incident.
The boarders are being shifted to Chilika hostel. Students said that many could have been “injured in the mishap had it happened a few hours earlier”.
Dilapidated condition
The Saberi hostel was inaugurated in 1989. Its boarders had been complaining about its dilapidated condition for the past many months. Concrete pieces were falling from the roofs of several rooms and water was seeping from the toilets on each of the three floors.
On July 15, the boarders had demanded that the university repair the hostel as early as possible.
