One killed four feared trapped as under construction building collapses in Rohini

New Delhi: Amidst a relentless monsoon downpour lashing the national capital, an under-construction four-storey residential building collapsed in northwest Delhi's Rohini Sector 16 on Wednesday evening. The catastrophic structural failure left one passerby dead, while at least four others are feared trapped deep beneath the heavy concrete rubble.

The Delhi Fire Service (DFS) received an emergency call regarding the structural cave-in near a local Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) school. Teams from the Delhi Police, DFS, and the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) immediately rushed to the spot, launching a joint, massive search-and-rescue operation alongside local residents who initially began clearing broken bricks with their bare hands.

 According to police officials, a 42-year-old motorcyclist, identified as Ram Kishore, was crushed by flying debris while riding past the construction site. He was extracted from the wreckage and rushed to a nearby hospital, where doctors declared him dead on arrival.  "Our immediate priority is to locate and pull out the trapped individuals.

The extensive debris and continuing rains are creating critical hurdles, but teams are working persistently," stated a senior disaster response official on-site.  Two laborers, Saddam and Ravi, were successfully pulled out alive from the wreckage with injuries and are undergoing emergency medical treatment at Baba Saheb Ambedkar Hospital. However, officials fear that the building owner's relative and a few construction workers remain buried under the collapsed concrete slabs.

While heavy monsoon rains have saturated the soil, a preliminary assessment by civic authorities indicates that internal plumbing work involving the improper drilling or cutting of primary structural beams and columns may have triggered the sudden collapse.