Vasai Wall Collapse: Police Arrests Contractors, Land Owners Booked As One Died & 5 Injured In Accident

A day after a 30-year-old labourer was killed and five others were gravely injured when an under-construction building wall collapsed on them on February 27 in Pelhar, Vasai East, the Pelhar police detained the building contractor and charged the owners.

The event occurred while the workmen were working on the construction site of an illegal godown. According to police authorities, the incident occurred at 6 p.m., however, it took at least two hours for the fire department to arrive at the Chaudhary Compound in Vakan Pada, Pelhar.

According to the authorities, the six workers were working at the site when a wall of the construction suddenly collapsed, trapping them beneath the debris. The residents and the other 14 workmen on the site hurried the injured men to Platinum Hospital in Vasai East, where one of them, Dasrath Gopal Lahange, 30, was proclaimed dead upon arrival.

“The labourers who were ordered by Hamid Chowdhary to move construction material upstairs for the construction work, were trapped under the debris after the wall collapsed while they were constructing illegal buildings inside the compound,” stated a police official from the Pelhar police station.

Police said the owners, Hamid and Rafiq Ahmed Chowdhary, had not obtained any licence to build the tower on the site. The contractor Lakshman Baraf, who had recruited the labourers, was arrested by authorities for allegedly failing to take any safety procedures for the workers. The injured–Shailesh Shingada 19, Ramu Maghi 25, Kalpesh Nadge 19, and Bharat Dumada 19–were taken to Apex Hospital in Waliv, Vasai East.

Locals claim that even after being notified, the fire department took at least two hours to arrive and begin rescue work. “The fire brigade carried on the rescue operation till 11 p.m. on Tuesday with the help of mobile flashlights, as they did not have proper lighting arrangement at the sight,” stated an eyewitness.