Wadala cave-in: Soil soft, prone to such incidents, IIT report says

An interim report on the Wadala wall-collapse incident, submitted in the Bombay High Court today by a team of experts from IIT-Bombay, said the soil in the area was mainly construction debris that allowed water ingress and hence, would be prone to such incidents in the future too.

A division bench of justices A S Oka and Riyaz Chagla had, earlier this month, asked the IIT to form a team of experts to inspect the site of the incident and suggest interim as well as permanent remedial measures.

The court was hearing a petition filed by the Dosti Blossom Co-operative Housing Society, challenging the permissions granted to Dosti Realty for constructing multi-storeyed buildings in the residential complex.

The counsel of the society, Atul Damle, argued that the construction work was causing damage to the existing buildings.

Referring to the incident of wall collapse last month, Damle sought a direction to the realty firm not to carry out any further construction.

The IIT team submitted an interim report on the issue today, in which it said it had inspected the area and suggested certain steps to be undertaken immediately.

"The work of backfilling is on. The basement area of the Dosti Blossom buildings shall be barricaded and shall not be used for parking cars or by the buildings' occupants for any reason. This shall be done till the remedial measures are completed," the report said.

It added that the soil was mainly construction debris dumped for levelling the site and this allowed water ingress.

"The soil is very soft in state, having high water content and possesses very low cohesive strength and about zero friction. The area receives excessive water during rainfall. This induces formation of cavities and flow of water into the soil and induces pressure," the report said.

It added that if permanent measures were not undertaken, there would always be a risk to the buildings.

"At the onset of monsoon on June 24-25 this year, the collapsed portion of the compound wall might have received large volumes of water. This might have led to instability to the said portion, leading to the catastrophic failure," it said.

After perusing the report, the bench posted the petition for further hearing on July 18.

On June 25, the compound wall of the Lloyd building, adjacent to the construction site of Dosti Realty in suburban Wadala, had caved in, burying several cars in the debris.