Mumbai building collapse: Death count rises to 10, claim police; housing minister says 12

The death count rose to 10 after a four-storey residential building collapsed in south Mumbai's congested Dongri area Tuesday, according to the Mumbai Police. About 40 to 50 people are feared trapped under the debris, civic officials said. State housing minister Radhakrishna Vikhe Patil, however, said 12 people were killed after the 'Kesarbaug building, located in a bustling narrow lane in Tandel Street of Dongri area of south Mumbai, crashed.

A BMC official said seven persons were injured in the collapse. Mumbai mayor Vishwanath Mahadeshwar said he has asked the municipal commissioner to launch a probe in the incident.

TV channels showed dramatic visuals of a child, wrapped in a cloth bundle, being carried out of the debris by rescue workers. The child is alive, officials said.

The Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) has opened a shelter at Imamwada Municipal Secondary Girls' School after the building collapse, a civic official said.

Scores of locals joined in the effort, forming a human chain to help in removing the debris brick by brick and picking up slabs of concrete to locate those buried.

Meanwhile, Vinod Ghosalkar, chief of the repair board of MHADA, said the building did not belong to the housing body as mentioned by a few locals and a legislator. 

Some part of the building was left standing after the collapse.

Fire brigade, Mumbai Police and civic officials rushed to the site but the constricted lanes made it difficult to access the area, reduced to a mass of rubble, twisted concrete and broken wires.

Ambulances could not reach the site and had to be parked around 50 metres away. 

Mumbai: Kesarbai building has collapsed at Tandel street, in Dongri. More than 40 people are feared trapped. pic.twitter.com/H2eVbtgaH6

— ANI (@ANI) July 16, 2019

Earlier, at least 15 people, mostly labourers hailing from West Bengal and Bihar, were killed when a boundary wall of a posh building collapsed in Pune.

Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis ordered the Pune Collector to conduct a detailed probe into the incident.

"Extremely saddened to know about loss of lives in the Pune wall collapse incident," said Fadnavis, announcing a compensation of Rs 500,000 to the kin of each deceased and Rs 25,000 for each injured in the tragedy.

The Pune police filed cases around a dozen persons including the top officials of Kanchan Builders and Alcon Stylus, their engineers and contractors for the tragedy, charging them with negligence and culpable homicide not amounting to murder.

"A team of the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) is reaching the spot. We are assuming that 10 to 12 families are still under the debris," Mumbadevi MLA Amin Patel told reporters at the spot.

Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis said the building was around 100 years old. It was not in the list of dilapidated buildings and was given to a developer for redevelopment.

Between 10 to 15 families lived in the building, he said