Thane: 7 dead after slab of five-storey building collapses in Ulhasnagar

The tragedy struck the 26-year old Sai Shakti Building with 29 flats. Pics/Sameer Markande

At least seven persons were killed and one person was injured after slabs of a ground-plus-five-storey building collapsed at Ulhasnagar in Thane district on Friday night, a civic official said.

The tragedy struck the 26-year old Sai Shakti Building with 29 flats, in Nehru Chowk area of the town at around 9 pm.

Locals said that there were some sudden rumbling sounds, vibrations and then the massive crash of the slabs from the living room areas of the building.

The slab of the fifth floor of the Sai Siddhi building in Nehru Chowk area collapsed, causing the slabs below to crash too, said Santosh Kadam, chief of the Regional Disaster Management Cell of Thane Municipal Corporation (TMC).

"Around 9 pm, the drawing room slabs of five flats - right from the top floor up to the bottom one - caved in. On being alerted, the personnel of the RDMC and the Thane Disaster Response Force (TDRF) rushed to the scene and launched a search and rescue operation," Kadam said.

"With the recovery of one more body from the debris, the fatality count in the incident has now gone up to seven. Three women, as many number of men and one boy died in the mishap," Kadam said.

The deceased belonged to two families residing in the building, he added.

The operation was called off at 12.46 am on Saturday following the recovery of the seventh body, the official said.

The deceased were identified as Punit Bajomal Panjwani (17), Dinesh Bajomal Panjwani (40), Deepak Bajomal Panjwani (42), Mohini Bajomal Panjwani (65), Krishna Induchand Bajaj (24), Amruta Induchand Bajaj (54) and Lovely Bajaj (20), he added.

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The injured person has been admitted to Central Hospital in Ulhasnagar and the rescue operation has been completed.

Thane district guardian minister Ekanth Shinde, who rushed to the spot to take stock of the situation, said the state government would provide financial assistance of Rs 5 lakh to the kin of each deceased, who include three women and one teenage boy.

Talking to reporters in the wee hours of Saturday, Shinde said he has informed about the incident to Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray.

"The state government would give Rs 5 lakh to the kin of each deceased," he said, adding that this is the second such incident in the area in the recent past.

"In 1994-95, the local civic body had demolished some of the unauthorised buildings by pulling down their slabs, pillars and rods. However, it has been observed that some developers welded the iron rods, recast the slabs and reconstructed the buildings. Such structures are now crashing down and claiming innocent lives," he said.

He directed Ulhasnagar municipal commissioner Raja Dayanidi to shift the occupants of such precarious buildings to safer places on war footing and also initiate strict action against such builders.

This is the second such incident in the area this month. On May 15, a similar slab collapse at an illegal building in the Ulhasnagar township had claimed five lives.

(With inputs from Anurag Kamble and agencies)