Wednesday, 15 January 2025
Wednesday, 15 January 2025
Kolkata Municipal Commission workers on Wednesday resumed the demolition of the building near Tollygunge that had tilted dangerously over neighbouring premises on Tuesday.
Some of the pillars of the four-storey building, named Shubho Apartment, crumbled on Tuesday afternoon, tilting the structure.
The residents of the building, whose construction started around 2009-10, had been evacuated weeks earlier and the developer had started efforts to try and address the tilting that was apparent
Tuesday’s cave-in happened when such an effort was underway
The building had been partially demolished late Tuesday night to prevent further risks. According to the FIR filed in the Netaji Nagar police station, “No sanction plan could be obtained so far regarding the building.”
Local councillor Debabrata Majumdar had said on Tuesday: “This building likely had no approved plan. It was built illegally on reclaimed wetland about 10-12 years ago,”.
Local CPM leaders have staged protests accusing the ruling Trinamul government of neglecting unauthorised constructions in the area, many of which were built during the CPM’s tenure.
A KMC official told The Telegraph the building was constructed without any permit from the civic body.
The attempts to save the building were also undertaken illegally, KMC sources said
The building has eight flats. Six of the flats were sold while two were with the developer, Subhash Roy, residents of the neighbourhood said. Roy had rented out one of the two flats
In March 2024, days after an illegal building collapsed in Garden Reach and killed at least 13 people, Roy contacted the residents of 3/47/D Vidyasagar Colony and told them that the building needed a "lifting" to correct its "orientation".
"We never faced any problem. But the family on the third floor used to complain that the orientation of their floor was wrong and that water in their washroom was not flowing in the right direction," Sheuli Bakshi, a resident of a ground-floor apartment, told The Telegraph
"The accused persons carried out a hydraulic jacking work at 3/47/D Vidyasagar Colony. The work was done by Nagra Building Construction Pvt Ltd, owned by one Abhishek Nagra, under the super- vision of the developer, Subhas Roy, without notifying the appropriate authorities or implementing proper structural and soil safety measures," a senior officer of Kolkata Police had told The Telegraph.
