June 10, 2007
Four Dead, Many Trapped after Chandigarh Roof Collapse
Chandigarh
Four people were killed and scores of others were trapped under a
50-metre concrete roof that collapsed Sunday in a vegetable market,
one of the busiest of its kind in north India, even as an army team
arrived to help in rescue efforts.
Police teams and ambulance vans were rushed to the grain and
vegetable market in Sector 26 after the roof came down around 4.30
p.m.
A massive rescue operation was launched by the Chandigarh
administration's fire, police and other departments to save those
trapped.
Over two-dozen people were rescued from the site and rushed to
government hospitals in the city. None of them was said to be in a
serious condition.
The civil administration sought help from the army authorities at
the nearby Western Command headquarters at Chandimandir.
Four bodies were removed from the site, a senior police official
said.
Police control room reports initially suggested that over 200 people
were trapped under the collapsed roof.
The roof was constructed nearly 30 years ago.
The vegetable market remains very busy on Sunday, especially in the
evening.
Senior civil and police officials went to the spot to supervise
rescue operations. Union Minister of State for Finance Pawan Kumar
Bansal, who is the local MP, also rushed to the spot.
Several cranes and evacuator machines were pressed into service to
cut and remove the roof. The rescue teams were taking longer to cut
through the roof so that those trapped were not harmed.
"We are racing against time. It's going to get dark soon and it will
become even more difficult to carry out rescue operations," a
Chandigarh police inspector said.
Hundreds of people from the market and also those whose relatives
and friends were present in the vegetable market when the roof
collapsed gathered at the spot.
"I have come to find out the whereabouts of my friend who is a
wholesale potato dealer," said businessman Preet.
Family members of vegetable traders and daily wage workers at the
market could be seen asking police and rescue workers regarding
details of their relatives and friends even as police had to use
force to push onlookers away from the spot.
Chaos prevailed as no disaster management plan of the civil
administration was in sight.
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