Kurla building collapse: ‘Prima facie responsible’: court rejects anticipatory bail plea of flat owner

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A SESSIONS court in Mumbai has rejected the anticipatory bail plea of a 38-year-old flat owner who had rented out her apartment in the building that collapsed in Kurla (East) last month. The applicant along with others was booked for ‘culpable homicide not amounting to murder’ for renting an apartment despite being aware that the building was dilapidated and could collapse any time.
Additional Sessions Judge S M Menjoge held on Monday that the applicant, Rajni Chetan Rathod, “was knowing that the said building was dangerous for human dwelling, she ought not to have let out the same and she is prima facie responsible for the said incidence and for proper investigation, her custodial interrogation is necessary.”
The four storey-building in Naik Nagar Cooperative Housing Society (CHS) collapsed on June 27 night, killing 19 persons and injuring several others. The police had booked flat owners Rajni Rathod, Kishor Chavan, Balkrishna Rathod, and others under sections 304 (culpable homicide not amounting to murder) and 308 (attempt to commit culpable homicide) of the Indian Penal Code. A contractor, identified as Dilip Vishwas, who accommodated labourers in the building, has also been named as an accused. The police applied charges under Section 308 as 15 persons were injured in the building collapse.
The court noted that as per an Assistant Engineer of the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC), all four buildings of the said CHS were declared as dangerous in 2013 itself and as well in dilapidated condition and electric and water supplies were cut in May 2016. After the occupants were issued notices to vacate the building, some of them vacated their houses but allowed tenants therein.
The applicant and others allowed tenants despite knowing that the said building was in dangerous condition. The prosecution further said that Dilip Biswas, a contractor, took the house of the applicant on rent and kept his labourers therein. Rathod’s lawyer submitted that she is falsely implicated in the case and since there was no criminal intention on her part, alleged offences cannot be levelled against her.
She said that her house was given on rent to Biswas, but he did not sustain any injury in the said incident and her custodial interrogation was not necessary and therefore be granted protection from arrest.
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The prosecution sought rejection of the plea on the ground that the offence is of serious nature. Police lawyer said that Rathod vacated her house for her own safety but allowed the tenant though she had knowledge about the building being in dangerous condition.
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