Chennai: The state government has informed the Madras high court that the entire process of demolishing the 12-storied building, adjacent to the collapsed multi-storied building at Moulivakkam here, which claimed 61 lives on June 28, 2014, is expected to be completed in another 15-20 days.
The CMDA stated this in its status report to a Division Bench comprising Chief Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul and Justice R. Mahadevan, when petitions by DMK treasurer M.K. Stalin came up for hearing.
In his petitions, Stalin sought a CBI probe into the building collapse and to demolish the adjacent building, besides giving compensation to the affected persons. Filing the status report, the CMDA sought some more time to remove entire structures.
When senior counsel P. Wilson, appearing for Stalin, submitted that another petition seeking transfer of investigation to CBI be heard, the court orally observed that let the demolition be completed and granted time to CMDA. The Bench posted the matter for Sept. 16 for further hearing.
In its status report, the CMDA submitted that the Supreme Court had ordered demolition of the existing unsafe building Block-A. Accordingly, the work of demolishing the building at a cost of '49.95 lakh was awarded to the contractor viz., M/S Maglink Infra Projects Pvt.Ltd. The building was proposed to be demolished using the advanced and safe technique of controlled implosive technology. This requires identification of spot for placing the explosives precisely. The preliminary work for demolition has started, CMDA said.
The CMDA said permission obtained by Maglink from the CoP lapsed on July 22 and the contractor was pursuing action to renew the same. The sequence of safe demolition of building using controlled blasting method had to be vetted by the IIT /SERC /Anna varsity as per agreement and for which the contractor was pursuing action with IIT-Madras.
