Mumbai : Seven people were killed and four injured on Friday morning when an abandoned seven-storey building in Vakola fell on small row-houses.
The 30-year-old building, Shankarlok, at Yashwant Nagar near Grand Hyatt hotel, fell on Katrin chawl, burying five houses at 11.30 am. “I saw it totter and yelled out to my sister and our neighbors to run out of their houses. Within a minute, it was all over,’’ said Pratibha Agare (35).
Six-year-old Jessica D’Silva noticed from her window that plaster was falling steadily from Shankarlok building and rushed out of her house with her grandmother and two dogs. “I am fortunate to be alive,’’ said the girl, whose parents are in Goa. Locals said that bits of the building had kept falling over the years.
Sujay Pujari (34) managed to extricate four members of his family, including his month-old daughter, from the debris as he was able to access them through a crack.
However, the Pardhi family was not so lucky. Three members of the family — a mother and two small kids — perished. The others who died were Sudha Sridharan and Chandraben Patel.
Interestingly, Sridharan lived on the ground floor of Shankarlok with her lawyer sister, Sandhya.
According to local corporator Sanjay Potnis, the building had been declared dangerous in 2007 after which 24 families vacated it. However, Sandhya, Potnis said, had got a stay order against vacating the building. In 2008, the building was propped up with wooden poles.
“Sandhya had alleged that that the builder and civic officials were in cahoots and hence wanted the building vacated,’’ said municipal commissioner Sitaram Kunte. He said Sandhya had even filed a criminal case against the BMC.
“We submitted an affidavit in the court that the building was indeed dangerous but the court allowed Sandhya to stay in the building at her own risk,’’ said the civic chief. The owner of the building, Shankar Sarin, sold it to builder Ashok Mastakar in 2007. The fire brigade, however, managed to save Sandhya’s husband.
Deputy Chief Fire Officer Sunil Nestrikar ruled out any more people being trapped in the debris. “We have accounted for all the 11 people who were supposed to be in there,’’ he said. The building is in a narrow lane and the earth mover entered with great difficulty. The National Disaster Relief Force too helped in the rescue operations.
“There are several such buildings in Mumbai which the residents are unwilling to vacate,’’ said Kunte, adding that they would approach the courts once again with fresh affidavits in these cases.
Sachin Unhalekar
