The building collapsed, killing 9 people and injuring 17 others.

Kolkata:

The builder of the collapsed multi-storey building in Kolkata’s Garden Ridge area violated several rules of the Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) for constructing new buildings, leading to the disaster, a senior official said on Monday. The building collapsed, killing 9 people and injuring 17 others.

The official told PTI that not only were they using low-quality materials to build the structure, but they were also using 10 mm poles instead of the 16 mm poles proposed by the KMC.

He added that despite the civic body’s approval for constructing a two-storey building on land at 1.5 Katha in KMC Sector 134, the builder constructed the five-storey building.

“Violation of rules is rampant. They have built 16 units of 500 sq ft. They are eager to hand over all the units, so they are trying to speed up the construction work there,” he said.

“Lower quality materials were used to save costs. 10mm rods were used for pouring instead of 16mm rods. They placed 5,000 bricks on top of the building and the building collapsed as it could not bear the weight. “The official said.

According to the new guidelines of KMC, deputy assistant engineers will go out to inspect units from now on.

“They will inspect different wards to look for illegal houses. If there are any violations, the illegal buildings will be demolished in the first phase,” he added.

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