Structural audit for CM’S official house

nNEW DELHI: Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal’s official residence at 6 Flagstaff Road in north Delhi’s Civil Lines is being assessed for its structural safety, senior officials in the government said on Thursday.

The structural safety audit was commissioned after portions of Kejriwal’s official residence saw repeated damage, ranging from a ceiling collapse to a wall crumbling down.

“Over the past two weeks, especially after the heavy rainfall the city witnessed in July, a lot of issues have emerged in the CM’S residence. Recently, the ceiling of the CM’S main office chamber, where he used to conduct public hearings, collapsed. Luckily, no one was injured because the chamber has not been used since the pandemic struck Delhi,” said a staff member deployed at the CM’S residence.

The Public Works Department (PWD) has now been tasked with making the buildings in the CM’S residence structurally sound. However, while civil engineers worked on refurbishing the collapsed ceiling of Kejriwal’s chamber, the ceiling of an adjoining toilet, used by visitors, also collapsed, an official said.

Another PWD official said the building where Kejriwal lives is nearly 80 years old.

“Workers were repairing the toilet’s ceiling after the collapse when a wall of the toilet also started to crumble,” he said.

“CM Kejriwal moved into this house in March 2015 and since then, there has been some structural problem or the other. So, it was decided that a complete structural safety audit of the entire residence would be conducted. Based on the findings of the audit, the future course of action will be decided. The actions could be many ranging from a complete renovation to targeted repair works,” the official said.

The CM’S office declined to comment.