17 killed near Kovai as rain brings down compound wall on 3 houses
Seventeen persons, including three children were killed, on Sunday night, when a three tile roofed houses collapsed after a 15 feet high compound wall fell on them, in Nadur village in Mettupalayam near Coimbatore.
All of them met their deadly fate, while they were fast asleep around 3.30 am, on Sunday. The fall of the compound wall triggered the collapse of three row houses one by one. As the victims couldn’t raise an alarm, they met with their end trapped in the rubble.
On receiving information, Fire and Rescue personnel and Revenue Department officials rushed to the spot and commenced operations with the help of local police by engaging an earth mover to remove the construction debris in search of those trapped inside. Soon, hope turned into despair as the rescue team began to recover only bodies of the victims one by one.
District Collector K Rajamani, West Zone IG K Periaiah, DIG Karthikeyan, Superintendent of Police Sujit Kumar and Revenue Department officials visited the incident spot and supervised the rescue operations. The bodies of the deceased persons were taken to Mettupalayam Government Hospital for a postmortem examination.
Following protests by villagers, the Mettupalayam police booked the house owner Siva Subramanian, a textile shop owner under IPC section 304 (A) for causing death by negligence and a search is on to nab him.
Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami condoled the death of 17 persons. In a statement, Palaniswami announced a solatium of Rs 4 lakh to the families of each of the victims.