The petitioners in this case included Rahul Jain, the owner of two floors in the building, and two civic officials from the Amravati Municipal Corporation.
The petitioners had urged the Court to quash the case filed against them following the building collapse, in which they had been booked under Sections 304A (causing death by negligence) and 308 (attempt to commit culpable homicide) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC).
The Amravati civic body informed the Court that it had issued multiple demolition notices since 2019 since the building structure was so dilapidated that it required immediate demolition (C1 category).
Meanwhile, Jain (flat owner) claimed that he had demolished his floors in the building on July 23, 2022.
Notably, the ground floor, which had several shops owned by various persons, of the building had not been demolished.
One of the shop owners on the ground floor had started some repair work in his shop which resulted in the collapsing of the entire structure on October 30, 2022.
This collapse led to the death of five workers in the debris. A criminal case was subsequently registered against the shop owner on the ground floor as well.
During the investigation, corporation officer Suhas Chauhan, sectional engineer Ajay Vinchurkar and Rahul Jain were added as accused persons.
Aggrieved by this, the three (applicants) approached the High Court with pleas to quash the case against them.
Source: Barandbench
