Thane: More than forty hours after an illegal seven-storey
building collapsed in Thane, the rescue operations have finally ended. The
tragedy led to 73 deaths; 62 have been injured.
There have been some miracle survivors too. Yesterday, a
10-month-old baby and a four-year-child were pulled out of the rubble several
hours after the building collapsed.
Maharashtra Chief Minister Prithviraj Chavan has confirmed
that the building was illegal and ordered an inquiry to determine why local
officials did not spot the construction and stop it. The Deputy Municipal
Commissioner and a senior cop from the local police station have been
suspended. The two builders responsible for the most recent disaster have gone
underground. The police have filed a case against them of culpable homicide not
amounting to murder.
A local resident named Mangal Patil had complained thrice
since February about the building and even submitted photographs to the Thane
Municipal Corporation, which is controlled by the Shiv Sena. He sent copies to
the Chief Minister's office, but says no one responded.
The Shiv Sena has passed the blame onto the Nationalist
Congress Party (NCP), saying its local MLA should have complained about the
illegal building. NCP leaders counter that Thane has many illegal buildings and
ask how the Sena-controlled civic body allowed these to come up.
In 2010, the government admitted that there were as many as
five lakh illegal buildings in Thane. Three years later, just 11,000 have been
demolished, a sign of the nexus between politicians, bureaucrats and
builders.
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