Over 200 illegal buildings sealed in Ghaziabad
The district administration on Saturday sealed as many as 221 unauthorised buildings across the district in the wake of the five-storey building collapse in Khoda. It also lodged a police complaint against the owner of the Khoda building. In Khoda alone, 78 illegal buildings were sealed and 11, which had developed cracks on the pillars and walls, evacuated. District magistrate Ritu Maheshwari said eight teams of sub-divisional magistrates had been formed to carry out inspections over the next few days. At 42, Khoda was followed by Loni in the number of buildings sealed. Modinagar and Muradnagar each had 27 shops and other buildings sealed, while nine were evacuated and sealed in Dasna. Sources in Khoda municipality said almost all houses in the area had come up illegally on government land. Asked why a sealing drive had not been carried out earlier, executive officer KK Bhadana said the civic body was relatively new and so long lacked proper infrastructure to conduct an inspection. The official said the municipality had lodged a police complaint against the owners of the five-storey building that collapsed on Friday — Delhi resident Rafiq Malik and Shamsuddin, a local resident — for violating government bylaws 10 year ago. The complaint said not only had the building come up on illegal land, the builders had not taken expert help to repair the cracks that had developed after a crane crashed against it two weeks ago.
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