An elderly couple died and two others were rescued after a major portion of a two-storeyed building, which housed seven families, located in a narrow lane in Triplicane, collapsed on Wednesday. Police said the ground floor of the building that could be more than 50-years-old, owned by the deceased couple, had no proper foundation.
It took about 100 firemen, six fire tenders and emergency rescue vehicles, Corporation labourers and volunteers about seven hours to complete the rescue work. Ten of the tenants escaped without injuries, as a part of their portion of the building remained intact.
Police said house owner couple Thyagarajan (60) and Manjuladevi (58) died, and a tenant, Bharathi (48), an employee of the Social Welfare Department, and her son Parthasarathy (21), who owns a shop on Mount Road, were rescued with minor injuries from under the rubble after the house on Sunguvar Lane collapsed at 7.15 am. Police sources said the ground floor was built with a clay roof, over 50 years ago. It was later removed to build the two floors which, neighbours said, could be over 30-yrs-old. Sources further said that a pillar and a wall of the building were damaged when a small house located right next to his was demolished a week ago. The 60-year-old had then assured his tenants that the building would be repaired and was about to bring in labourers on Wednesday, but by then it caved in, police said. “There is no proper foundation and a major part of the house was built with limestone and sand. Its only support seemed to be the small house sticking right next to it that was demolished. Also, the house owner had added a new layer of flooring with tiles to the already existing second floor and that had added more weight to the shaky foundation,” a police officer said.
Fire tenders and emergency rescue vehicles rushed to the spot and rescue work began around 8 am. The firemen had a huge task to first access the building, as the lane was too narrow for the fire tenders. They were taken to the back of the house, located on Sunguvar Street. Around 9 am, Manjuladevi’s body was recovered from under the huge pile of debris. Later, Parthasarathy was rescued after his father Amirthalingam, the joint director in the Social Welfare Department, identified the spot where his wife and son were trapped. Thyagarajan, who was rescued, died en route to the hospital. Bharathi was rescued about seven hours after she got trapped, at 2.30 pm. “The narrow lane made it difficult for us. Also, the power supply was disconnected and so we could not use a drilling machine. We had to manually remove the debris,” a fire service official said. “Thankfully, we could hear the mother and her son calling for help. They were saved as they were trapped beneath a door,” the official said. A case was registered under 174 CrPC.
7 families in 3 floors
According to police, three families, including that of Deviprasad and Ravi, lived on the ground floor. Deviprasad’s family of five escaped, as their portion remained intact. Ravi and his family had gone to Bengaluru, while the tenants did not have any information about the third family, who were not on the spot.
The first floor too had three families — that of Amrithalingam, Gopal, whose family had gone out of town and he had gone to his shop nearby, and Gururajan, whose portion also did not sustain any damage. The second floor was occupied by the owners. Tenants and eyewitnesses recalled that they had earlier complained about cracking and leaking roofs.
Amrithalingam, who had a narrow escape, claimed, “I complained last week that the roof is cracking and the front door had moved from its level making it difficult to lock it,” he said.
Tenants said the owner had brought his engineer relative, who had assured that the house was strong. They claimed that iron rods were fixed on Tuesday to repair the damage on the pillar and wall after the demolition next door and work was to start on Wednesday. Deviprasad, who escaped narrowly along with his family, said a storm of dust engulfed his house seconds after the rest of the building collapsed. “I immediately came out and carried my mother suffering from stroke to my relative’s house,” he said. Lakshmi, a maid in Thyagarajan’s house, recalled, “The old woman was in the balcony and her husband was on the phone when I was standing outside. I saw the house going down and I screamed at the woman but before she could hear me, it was all over.”
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