Altaf Hamid Rao
MIRPUR (AJK): (Parliament Times) At least 09 persons out of 30 people were reportedly injured seriously as they were feared buried under the debris of a 05 storied building of marriage-cum-banquet hall in Chakswari town in Mirpur district of Azad Jammu Kashmir on Friday, authorities confirmed. The five-storied mega building complex of Roopayal Marriage cum Banquet hall caved in suddenly at about 11.30 a.m on Friday when the renovation work in the building was in progress. Rescue teams belonging to Pak Army headed by Brig. Saeed and Brig. Irfan, teams of NDMA – National Disaster Management Authority, SDMA, State Disaster Management Authority, Rescue 1122, civil defense, local volunteers and police immediately rushed the scene of occurrence to join the relief works to rescue the victims – at least 30 in number, police and the eye witnesses said. Sixteen of the trapped persons , mostly the laborers, nine of them in very critical condition were rescued by the relief teams till last reports came in by this evening. The seriously injured persons was shifted to the local as well as Mirpur Div. Headquarter hospital where their condition is stated to be critical. The victims including owner of the ill-fated building – identified asChoudhry Nadeem Roopayal who was also trapped in the collapsed structure of the mega building complex. Relief work to search the missing persons in the debris was in progress till the filing of this report Friday evening. The true cause of the building collapse could not be ascertained sofar. Authorities are investigating. Besides AJK minister for disaster management Ahmed Raza Qadri, Mirpur divisional and district administration officials led by Div. Commissioner Muhammad Raqeeb, DC Raja Tahir Mumtaz, SSP Mirpur Raja Irfan Saleem and others immediately rushed the scene of occurrence and supervised the rescue operations which were continuing till the last reports came in.