Gzb collapse: Building was being made without approval

The incident took place on Sunday evening in Loni’s Roop Nagar industrial area in which two people died and nine people, including one of the plot owners, were also injured

A day after two workers were killed after shuttering of an under-construction building collapsed in Loni, Ghaziabad development authority (GDA) officials on Monday said that it was being constructed without a layout approval. Action has also been initiated against three officials for dereliction of duty, the authority added.

Two workers were killed after the shuttering of the under-construction building collapsed in Ghaziabad on Sunday. (Sakib Ali/HT PHOTO)

The incident took place on Sunday evening in Loni’s Roop Nagar industrial area in which nine people, including one of the plot owners, were also injured. What possibly led to the collapse of the single-storey building was use of “inferior” quality construction material, officials said, and the shuttering was laid without adequate support.

On Monday, an FIR was lodged against the plot owner, Madan Pal Sharma,70,for negligence, GDA officials said.

“In connection with the incident, a work supervisor from Loni has been suspended. Departmental proceedings have been initiated against an assistant engineer while recommendation to suspend a junior engineer has been moved. We have also written to the state government in this regard. An explanation has also been sought from the executive engineer, while an FIR was lodged against the plot owner,” said Brijesh Kumar, secretary of GDA.

The officials under scanner were responsible for disallowing construction of buildings without a map approval from GDA. “The officials should have served notice and stopped the work but they failed to notice the construction,” Kumar added.

At the time of the collapse, there were 13 people at the site. While worker Rajesh Kumar, 30, a native of Bareilly, and labour contractor Sameer Karim, 40, a resident of Loni, were crushed to death, nine people were rescued during the rescue operations which went on till late Sunday night. Two remaining people had escaped after sustaining minor injuries, officials said.

In connection with the incident, Ghaziabad police filed the FIR against plot owner Sharma and other unidentified people under sections 304 (culpable homicide not amounting to murder), 337 (causing hurt by rash and negligent acts) and 338 (causing grievous hurt by act endangering life or personal safety of others) of the Indian Penal Code at Loni police station.

While details of the other owner were still not available, no arrest has been in connection with collapse as Sharma was under treatment. “We will question Sharma once he recovers,” said Rajneesh Kumar Upadhyaya, ACP (Loni).

GDA’s executive engineer Manvendra Singh said that the plot was spread on an area of 280 square metres. “This was going on without any approvals and it is suspected that inferior quality material was also used. The structure of the shuttering laid for construction of roof was not proper and seemed to have no support in the middle portion. All these factors combined led to the collapse,” Singh said.

RK Singh, the district magistrate who also holds charge of the vice-chairperson of GDA, did not respond to queries for a statement on the incident.