Even as the roof collapse of Somanur bus stand in rural Coimbatore yesterday had claimed five precious lives and left several others injured, pertinent questions with regard to the safety norms adopted for public buildings come to the fore.
As the dilapidated bus stand in Somanur suddenly collapsed and came crashing to the ground yesterday at around 1.45 pm, Coimbatoreans heard the news in bewilderment.
The collapsed bus stand was constructed only in 2004 and it has collapsed with in a period of decade and half. But the tell- tale symptoms of debris found in the accident site, is a pointer to the substandard construction quality of the collapsed bus stand. "The contract of which must have been given to a contractor with ruling party connections", the public believe.
While structural engineers say that "a 3:1 ration of cement versus sand mixing ratio should be maintained, lest the structure would develop cracks and loose its structural stabiltity within years".
An unscruplous contrctor who had constructed the bus stand might have had an eye for huge profits and might not have adhered to bench mark quality control in construction materials used for the project.
"Often the members of ruling party, or their proxies are awarded the building contracts leading to wide spread corruption and the structures constructed like this suffer from lack of stability and quality" say social activists, who are shocked by the accident.
SimpliCity spoke to few structural engineers to vouch for the fact that the Somanur accident could have been avoided if quality construction waa carried out. "Instead of maintaining 3:1 ration in concrete they would have gone for 8:1 ratio of concrete of sand and cement mixture, which might have resulted in the collapse" said a structural engineers from the city.
"Water seepage during rainy season could also lead to weakening of the structure and water could seep through the roofing making the roof vulnerable to collapse, which must be case in this accident, as it is a rainy season" say civil engineers.
Citizens who are shell-shocked by the roof collapse question if the Madras High court would take suo motu cognizance on the matter and order an inquiry.
The authorities should go for stability check of old and weakened buildings and order immediate demolition of such structure in the city to avoid any further mishaps, the citizens say.
Blatant violations in construction norms have become the order of the day. Compensating few lakhs to the families of the victim and visiting the injured in the hospital has become a regular norm to the politicians whose distinct relatives are mostly the contractors for developmental projects.
In any case, when the elected legislator is not bothered to safeguard the welfare of the people of his constituency, why will his distinct relative ever strain to be fair?