Delhi hostel collapse exposes MCD enforcement gaps; 5 senior officials suspended

A day after a building collapse in South Delhi killed seven people, including five students, the Delhi government moved to suspend five senior officials of the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD), including the Deputy Commissioner of the South Zone.

According to officials, the action was intended to signal that accountability would extend beyond the building’s owners to those responsible for enforcing building and safety regulations. An office order issued by the MCD Vigilance Department’s Deputy Law Officer on September 7 said, “Rakesh Kumar, Deputy Commissioner, South Zone, is hereby placed under suspension with immediate effect as per DMC Services (Control & Appeal) Regulations, 1959.” The order said he would be paid a subsistence allowance in accordance with the rules.

Four other MCD officials were also suspended: Superintending Engineer Ranvir Singh, Executive Engineer Lalit Kumar, Assistant Engineer Sunil Chauhan and Junior Engineer Ashish Kumar. The suspensions have put the MCD’s building enforcement system under scrutiny, raising questions about whether officials failed at multiple points to detect and act on potentially dangerous work at the property.

“The collapse has exposed possible gaps in field-level inspections and the reporting of building violations,” a senior civic official said. According to MCD officials, the collapsed building — P-14, a property in a resettlement colony with an area of about 55 square yards — consisted of a basement and four floors above ground.

It was reportedly constructed in the 1990s. Officials said on Sunday that the MCD had no record of the property ever being booked for a building violation or sealed. “We had received no complaints of any work at this property,” an MCD official said.

The initial police investigation, according to sources, has revealed that repair work had been underway for about a week in the basement and on the ground floor. The work was intended to address chronic waterlogging, and workers had been hired for the job, sources said.

Senior MCD officials said that work particularly which deviated the sanctioned building plan needs permission from the civic body. “The question is therefore not only whether the building was structurally unsafe, but whether the civic enforcement machinery had mechanisms in place to detect and intervene when work was being carried out,” another source said.

Officials also flagged the role of the junior engineer, who is typically the MCD’s closest point of contact with buildings in the field. “A junior engineer is the field-level officer who is the man on the ground,” the senior official said.

“If he observes and finds any house or building flouting building norms, he has to report it to the A.E., who then prepares a notice.” In the case of P-14, however, officials said there was no record of a booking or sealing action against the property.

“That raises questions about whether the building was inspected, whether any violations were detected and, if they were, whether they were properly escalated through the enforcement chain,” an official said.