A Trinamool councillor was purportedly caught on camera hurling expletives at a team of Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) engineers trying to stop the demolition of an illegal building in Metiabruz on Wednesday.

The engineers went to demolish a six-storey structure in Masjid Talab Lane in Metiabruz on Tuesday when the councillor of Ward 137, Wasim Ansari, was purportedly seen in the video barging in with some men and abusing the engineers.

The man resembling Ansari was heard saying there was an “injunction” against the demolition.

He was heard saying: “Order dekha hain? Order dekha hai jo aaya hain? (Have you seen the order? Have you seen the order that has come?)”

“Tum log court ka order dekhta nahi hain, chala aata hain (You come without going through the court’s order),” he was heard saying. He was heard using abusive words several times.

Senior KMC officials could not say whether there was any court order against the demolition.

An official said a team of four sub-assistant engineers and a demolition squad went to the spot armed with a demolition order approved by the mayor and the municipal commissioner.

“They went to pull down the structure as it had come up without any building permit. The entire structure is illegal,” the official said.

“The councillor arrived after we started the demolition. He abused our engineers and also threatened to push them down from the terrace,” the official told Metro.

The civic team then leftthe spot.

KMC sources said people had started living on five of the six floors. The top floor was still unoccupied. “The team went to pull down the top floor and faced resistance,” said theofficial.

When asked about the threats faced by the civic team, mayor Firhad Hakim said he had instructed that the “demolition of the illegal building will not stop”.

“Law will take its course. When a house collapses, like in Garden Reach, many people die,” Hakim said.

An under-construction illegal building collapsed in Garden Reach (Ward 134) in March killing 13 people.

Ward 137, where the KMC team faced resistance on Wednesday, is part of the same borough — XV — as Ward 134. Both wards are within the Kolkata Port constituency which Hakim represents in theAssembly.

Metro called Ansari on Wednesday evening for his reaction to the allegations against him. He disconnected the call on hearing that it was from a newspaper. All subsequent calls went unanswered.

The demolition order was passed under Section 408 of the KMC Act, which empowers the civic body to pull down an illegal structure without allowing those accused of building it a chance to defend themselves.

“A demolition order under this provision is usually issued when a large portion of a structure is deemed illegal,” an engineer said.

A KMC engineer said there is an established procedure to inform the authorities about a court ruling against a demolition order passed by thecivic body.

“The court order must be served to the local police station and the executive engineer of the borough where the building is located. That was not done in this case. We are verifying whether there is any court order against the demolition,” said a KMC official.

“We want to know from the mayor how the KMC would protect engineers from such councillors,” said a member of the KMC Engineers and Allied Services Association.