11 dead as compound wall collapses in Tamil Nadu’s Thiruvallur district

At least 11 people were killed after a compound wall collapsed near Oppiripalayam in Tiruvallur District, Tamil Nadu on Sunday. A 19-year-old youth, Nagaraj, was rescued from the debris and admitted to the Government Stanley Hospital for treatment. Photo: V. Ganesan

Eleven persons, including a teenager and a two-year-old boy, were crushed to death when a compound wall adjoining their hutments collapsed near a construction site at Almathy in Ponneri, 50 km from Chennai, in the early hours of Sunday.

The sole survivor, Nagaraj, 19, is undergoing treatment at Stanley Medical College Hospital. They were all from families of migrant labourers working at the construction site on the Uparapalayam Road. One body is yet to be identified. Of the remaining 10, eight were from Srikakulam district of Andhra Pradesh and two from Odisha.

A rescue team of the Tiruvallur district administration reached the spot around 7.30 a.m., five hours after the incident, and pulled out Nagaraj from the rubble. By then, the locals had extricated eight bodies.

In a statement, Chief Minister Jayalalithaa expressed grief and announced a solatium of Rs. 2 lakh each for the families of the deceased and Rs. 50,000 to the injured.