Three persons were killed and over 40 feared trapped as a century-old four-storey building collapsed in Mumbai's congested Dongri locality on Tuesday.
Eight people have been rescued so far from under the debris by three large teams of the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) looking for survivors. The area, full of dilapidated buildings on narrow lanes, was also flooded in heavy rain in the past weeks.
Ten ambulances and fire-fighting trucks were parked some distance away from the building as they could not enter the narrow bylanes. Crowds thronged the narrow lanes - where it would be extremely difficult for heavy machines to reach - and formed a human chain passing with their bare hands small debris like wooden blocks and bricks towards the outer area of the neighbourhood. "The building was 100 years old. We have given permission to redevelop that area... We will know after investigation if the redevelopment initiative was delayed,” Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis told reporters.
Mumbai, India’s financial capital and home to Bollywood, is one of the most congested cities of the world after Dhaka, according to the World Economic Forum statistics.
