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MUMBAI — Three persons were killed and two others injured after a four-storey residential building collapsed in Navi Mumbai's CBD Belapur area early on Saturday, officials said.
The two injured persons were pulled out alive from under the rubble after the incident that occurred at 4.50 am in Shahbaz village, they said, adding that the scale of the tragedy could have been bigger had 52 other residents of the building not been evacuated in time after cracks were noticed in it in the wee hours.
"The four-storey building with 13 residential units and three shops collapsed early this morning. A man and a woman who were trapped under the rubble were rescued and admitted to a hospital," Navi Mumbai Municipal Corporation (NMMC) Commissioner Kailas Shinde said.
The National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) and the personnel of the civic body's fire brigade launched a rescue operation. Around noon, the body of a man was recovered from under the debris, while the bodies of two others were recovered hours later, a civic official said.
The deceased were identified as Mohammad Miraj Altaf Hussain (30), Miraj Saif Ansari (24) and Safique Ahmed Rahmat Ali Ansari (28). Their bodies were sent to a government hospital for post-mortem, he said.
According to the municipal commissioner, the collapsed building was 10 years old and a probe will be conducted into the cause of the crash.
Talking to PTI, NMMC's divisional fire officer Purushottam Jadhav said, "In the wee hours, some residents noticed cracks in the building and alerted the authorities about it. The fire brigade team reached the spot and evacuated 52 residents, including 13 children, from the building. The structure collapsed some time after that."
Two persons - Lal Mohammad (22) and Rukhsana (21) - were rescued from under the rubble around 6 am. The authorities later learnt that one person was feared trapped under the debris and the rescue teams tried to call him on his mobile, but in vain. Later on, they came to know that two of his friends were also with him at that time, he said.
A dog squad also assisted the rescue teams, the NDRF official said.
Meanwhile, Chief Minister Eknath Shinde, who was in Delhi for Niti Aayog's governing council meeting, spoke to the Navi Mumbai municipal commissioner and directed him that necessary assistance be provided to the injured and affected persons, an official release by the Thane district administration said.
The NDRF said final search is being carried out and the work of removing the debris is underway.
Earlier this week, heavy and incessant rains lashed Mumbai, Navi Mumbai, Thane, Raigad and parts of the Maharashtra capital metropolitan region. However, the showers have taken a break in the past two days.\