Compound wall crushes woman biker to death in Kalyan

KALYAN: A 22-year-old woman died after a wall near an underconstruction building collapsed on her on Thursday.

Veena Ganiga, a resident of Sahyadari nagar in Kalyan (West), was riding her twowheeler and was crossing the under-construction 14-storey building at 7.40am when the freak incident took place. She suffered severe injury to her head, leading to her death.

The 14-foot compound wall was built around the half-constructed building Triveni located behind the Kalyan Regional Transport Office (RTO).

A narrow road along the compound wall leads to Sahyadri Nagar. Most residents of the area use the road to enter the RTO premises and then take the road towards the station.

Ganiga, who worked at a private firm in Powai, had been taking the road every day. On Thursday, she left her house as usual but a few minutes later the compound wall collapsed on her.

She was removed from the debris by the locals and sent to Kalyan civic hospital and was later shifted to Rukminibai civic hospital, where she was declared dead. A case has been registered against the builder (whose name the police did not have), contractor Ketan Patel and supervisor Mahesh Shinde.

Locals alleged that the builder had built the compound wall and used the space to store building materials. After the collapse, the rest of the wall was demolished by the Kalyan-Dombivli Municipal Corporation (KDMC).

“The wall collapsed due to the builder’s negligence as heaps of bricks were stored along the wall, burdening the wall,” said Chandrakant Rane, 52, a resident.

Residents of the area alleged that fire officials and the police reached the spot after two hours of the incident. This delayed in taking Ganiga to the hospital.

Rane said: “It would have been worse had the nearby school not been shut. Schoolchildren use the road every day throughout the day. Fortunately, Diwali vacations are on and school was closed.”

Ganiga’s neighbor Arun Jadhav said the family is in shock.

“They have lost their young daughter. Veena used to work at Powai and travelled to the Kalyan railway station on her two-wheeler very day. The builders involved in such kind of construction work should be punished,” he said.

Senior police inspector of Khadakpada police station Gulabrao Gore said: “We inspected the spot and registered a case against the builder and the contractor. We have not yet made any arrest.”

A case under section 304 (a) for causing death by negligence has been registered.

The wall collapsed due to the builder’s negligence as heaps of bricks were stored along the wall, putting a load on it. CHANDRAKANT RANE, a Kalyan resident