Building collapse in Thane, 10 dead

Ten persons were killed in Kalwa locality of Thane district in Maharashtra when a portion of a building collapsed on Tuesday afternoon.

Till the time this report was filed, authorities had retrieved 10 bodies, including four females and six males.

Four injured person, including a 30-year-old woman, were rescued alive.

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Located in the congested Gaondevi area in Kalwa west, the portion of Sonubai Niwas, a three-storied structure housing 12 tenements, came crashing down at 4.30 pm IST.

"We heard a loud thud and there was dust everywhere and we were not able to see what had happened. We suspected that it would be our adjacent building, as it was in visibly bad condition," said Naturam Patil, who resides in the neighbouring building. 

Officials suspect that collapse may have been triggered by the tremors of the earthquake (2.5 on the Richter scale) that was felt in parts of Mulund and Thane on the wee hours of Tuesday.

Incidentally, some of the residents were on the verge of evacuating on Tuesday after the tremors and had employed labourers for shifting the belongings.

The labourers are also feared to be among the casualties.

The residents of Sonubai Niwas were not as fortunate as the residents of Babu Hafeez Jindani building, also in Kalwa, who realised that their structure was sinking and escaped in the nick of time on August 3.

Local Member of Legislative Assembly Jitendra Awhad had earlier warned that there would many more collapses owing to poor constructions on marshy land. 

Though the authorities have employed a bulldozer to facilitate the removal of debris, rescue operations have been hampered due to lack of space for manoeuvring vehicles.