Delhi Police have arrested three contractors after a four-storey under-construction building collapsed in Chawri Bazar, central Delhi, killing two labourers and injuring several others. The arrests have brought renewed scrutiny to alleged unauthorised construction and whether warnings about the site were acted upon in time.
The accused have been identified as Siraj, Tajuddin and Furkan. Police apprehended them from Sirohi village in Dauj tehsil of Faridabad. The three men, who are residents of Delhi’s Ajmeri Gate area, were arrested in a case registered under Section 105 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, which deals with culpable homicide not amounting to murder, police said.
The building collapsed at around 9.30am on Thursday while workers were laying a lintel. Local residents told police that around 15 people were working at the site when the third floor gave way, bringing down the structure. Seven people were pulled from the rubble, but two later died from their injuries.
Delhi Police, the National Disaster Response Force, the Delhi Fire Service and the Municipal Corporation of Delhi continued search and rescue operations after the collapse, with concerns that more workers could be trapped beneath the debris. The incident occurred in one of central Delhi’s most densely built and heavily used areas, where construction activity takes place within narrow lanes and close to occupied buildings.
The FIR names the building owner, Samiullah, and the contractors. A senior police officer said police had alerted the MCD about unauthorised construction at the site nearly five months before the collapse. The statement places the enforcement timeline at the centre of the investigation, although the report does not establish what action followed the alert or whether the warning was formally closed.
The MCD said it had inspected the building and found the owner undertaking repair work. According to the civic body, it received no subsequent complaint about fresh construction or demolition. The difference between the police account of an earlier warning and the MCD’s description of the work and subsequent complaints is now part of the wider administrative inquiry.
The civic body has suspended an assistant engineer and a junior engineer for prima facie dereliction of duty, pending further investigation. The suspensions indicate that the inquiry will examine not only the contractors’ conduct but also the municipal inspection and enforcement process. The next steps are expected to include the police investigation into the deaths and the MCD’s internal inquiry into the site’s construction activity and official response.
