Ranjit Mahanti
An unoccupied seven stories building collapsed in Vakola, Santacruz on Friday costing 7 innocent lives and injured 4 people. The building was located near a slum and the debris fell on the adjacent slum causing these deaths of the people residing in the slum.
According to the BMC and Police officials the incident took place on Friday at around 10.30am. A large portion of the building named Shankar Lok Apartment near the Grand Hyatt Hotel fell to dust. While it was officially uninhabited, a family was living in the building illegally, said the local residents. The building was supposed constructed in the year 1980-81 and has been condemned as unsafe by the city officials.
Many residents got trapped under the debris of a huge pile of slabs, rubble and dust. The trapped people who were rescued were admitted immediately to the VN Desai hospital located in the nearby area but 7 people were declared dead.
The death list in the incident includes;
1. Chandraben Kantilal Patel (46)
2. Sudha Shridharan (32)
3. Louis Bobetura Nonas (60)
4. Sunderabai Rajaram Pardhi (66)
5. Aditya Anil Pardhi (10)
6. Ayush Anil Pardhi (7)
7. Rajshri Anil Pardhi (35).
The collapse also injured a few namely; Akshay Suresh Kesarkar (21), Sitabai Ramchandra Kesarkar (66), Rohini Sudhodhan Jagtap (45) and Satyam Shridharan (39).
Last September, a rundown residential block in Mumbai collapsed, killing 60 people. Another building collapse in the outskirts of the city in April last year, killing 74. Some of the tragedies have underlined shoddy construction standards and lax building code enforcement