Journalism of Courage
Hours after three women died after the compound wall of a residential society near Dandekar Bridge collapsed,the Dattawadi police have registered an offence against the developer of the property for causing deaths due to negligence. The complaint said the wall was constructed as an extension of an old and weak structure,causing its collapse after heavy rains.
On the other hand,the Pune Municipal Corporation served a show-cause notice on the developer,the architect and the RCC consultant of the property on Monday.
Around 8 pm on Sunday,the 100-foot-long and 20-foot high retaining wall,which was recently constructed on the rear side of the Suvarnanand Park society,collapsed,killing three women and damaging several vehicles. The wall crashed on the footpath of the road that connects Dandekar Bridge to Dattawadi. Madhavi Pangarkar (58) of Bibvewadi,Meera Athalye (50) of Narayan Peth and Sharda Yashwant Mazire (50) of Dattawadi,who were walking on the footpath,died in the accident.
The Dattawadi police have registered the case under Sections 304 (culpable homicide not amounting to murder) and 427 (causing damage). Senior inspector Satish Govekar said,We have booked Vinay Mule of developers A V Mule Associates,the engineer and the contractor at the site. When we sent our teams to their houses,none of them could be found. Their houses and offices are locked.
Govekar added,We have also asked the Pune Municipal Corporation to conduct an inquiry to find out whose fault was it. Our probe has revealed that it was an old and weak structure… The old structure was constructed without any concrete. It is a clear case of negligence that has caused the mishap.
The PMC,meanwhile,brushed off any responsibility towards the collapse as it held the developer,the architect and the RCC consultant of the property entirely responsible for the mishap.
The PMC is not responsible for the incident as it is the responsibility of the property owner to take effective safety measures at the site that is being developed,as per the provisions of Development Control (DC) rules, said Sudhir Kadam,Executive Engineer of PMC.
It was found that proper safety measures were not taken by the developer at the site,he said,adding the RCC consultant and the architect failed to carry out a proper structural audit,which led to structural failure and the weak wall collapsed. The PMC has served a show-cause notice on developer A V Mule,RCC consultant Vijay Ruikar and architect Dilip Kale. The administration will initiate action against them after verifying their response to the notice in three days, said Kadam,adding that the wall was constructed in 1968.
Meanwhile,local corporator Dhananjay Jadhav has urged the police to register a case of culpable homicide against civic officers,along with the developer,saying the civic staff gave completion certificate to the building only after verifying the construction of the wall. The wall is quite old and was merely repaired,while it should have been reconstructed while the property was being developed, he said.
Jadhav alleged that there were financial dealings between the civic staff and the developer concerned because of which the condition of the wall was ignored. The construction quality of the wall was poor and it is also necessary to verify whether the development of the property was as per the plan sanctioned by the PMC. The developer ignored the condition of the wall while the civic staff issued completion certificate for the property despite the bad state of the wall, he added.
