People protest against the anti-encroachment drive in Meerut after four people were killed and others injured as a building was demolished on Saturday. (Photo: PTI)
People protest against the anti-encroachment drive in Meerut after four people were killed and others injured as a building was demolished on Saturday. (Photo: PTI)
Four persons were killed and some more are feared dead under the debris when the cantonment board employees used a bulldozer to demolish an illegal building complex in Meerut’s Sadar area on Saturday morning.
The local people staged massive protests and clai-med that some people we-re inside the building when the cantonment board started using the bulldozer to pull down the building.
The team from the cantonment board fled from the site as soon as people started gathering. Cases have been registered against six members of the cantonment board.
A 42-member team of NDRF reached the site and began a rescue operation to remove the debris and rescue those buried under it.
Meerut division commissioner Alok Sinha said that Bungalow No. 210 was demolished by the cantonment board authorities during an anti-encroachment drive during which a few people, who apparently were still in the building, were buried under the rubble. Four of them died, while three were injured. They have been admitted to a hospital. SSP Meerut J. Ravindra Gaur admitted that it was a major lapse on the part of the cantonment board to have started the demolition without checking if anyone was inside the building. “The manner in which the dem-olition began was highly unprofessional. There should have been more planning and caution in the operation,” he said.
The Meerut Cantonment Board assistant engineer, Piyush Gautam, said that a notice was sent to its occupants to vacate the building as it had been illegally built. The area was marked for demolition and the timing of 3 am was decided.
The building in question houses a shopping complex and was allegedly built without requisite permissions.
Sources said that the demolition team had reached the complex late on Friday night and began demolishing work at around 5 am Saturday.
The local people rushed in to rescue the injured persons and rushed them to the hospital where the doctors declared four of them brought dead.
BJP MP Rajendra Agar-wal, later in the day, led a protest along with traders and local people demanding immediate action aga-inst those responsible for the demolition operation.
The situation in Meerut, meanwhile, remains tense.
