Skip to content
Search

Latest Stories

India rescuers pull 4-year-old survivor from collapsed building as toll climbs

Rescuers in India pulled a four-year-old boy from the rubble of a collapsed building to loud cheers on Tuesday (25), hours after the five-storey apartment block came down "like a house of cards", killing 11 and burying up to 60 others.

The accident late Monday (24) in the western town of Mahad led three disaster-response teams and sniffer dogs to work through the night, combing tin sheets, twisted metal and broken bricks.

Officials said many residents of the 47 flats inside the building were spared because they had already fled the town to escape the coronavirus pandemic.


The cause of the accident was not immediately clear but building collapses are common during India's June-September monsoon, with old and rickety structures buckling after days of non-stop rain.

National Disaster Response Force spokesman Sachidanand Gawde told reporters that locals and emergency workers had retrieved the bodies of 11 victims in addition to the little boy who survived the collapse.

Video of the rescue effort showed onlookers applauding and cheering as the child was plucked out of the wreckage and hauled up on a stretcher.

Estimates of the number trapped ranged from 20 to 70 on Tuesday morning after dozens managed to flee when the building began to shake.

"No one knows how many people are actually stuck inside," a Mahad police official told AFP on condition of anonymity, adding that authorities had initially feared much worse, with early estimates as high as 200.

Mahad legislator Bharat Gogawale said that many of the building's occupants appeared to have been out shopping when the accident occurred around 7pm.

Others had left the town altogether, preferring to wait out the pandemic in their home villages.

"Many families were not residing in the building as they went to their native places due to the coronavirus-induced lockdown," district official Nidhi Choudhari said.

More For You

China pledges to be a good friend and partner to Bangladesh

Xi Jinping

China pledges to be a good friend and partner to Bangladesh

THE Chinese president, Xi Jinping, last Friday (28) pledged deeper cooperation with his Bangladeshi counterpart Muhammad Yunus in a meeting that came as Dhaka seeks new friends to offset frosty ties with India.

Yunus took charge of Bangladesh last August after the toppling of former prime minister Sheikh Hasina, who fled to New Delhi after a student-led uprising.

Keep ReadingShow less
Milton-Keynes

Eyewitnesses described hearing shouting before the shooting

iStock

Man shot dead by police outside Milton Keynes railway station

A MAN was shot dead by police outside Milton Keynes Central station after reports that he was carrying a firearm.

Thames Valley Police (TVP) said officers were called to the station at 12:55, where they challenged a suspect carrying a knife. The man moved towards officers before police fired at him.

Keep ReadingShow less
EXCLUSIVE: Eastern Eye wins press freedoms to help judges

SCRUTINY: The tribunal’s favourable verdict is an important win for accountability, say current and retired Asian judges (Pic credit: Getty Images/Leon Neal)

EXCLUSIVE: Eastern Eye wins press freedoms to help judges

A tribunal has ordered the body which appoints judges in England and Wales to disclose records it refused to give to Eastern Eye.

The decision is a major victory for press freedoms because it forces the Judicial Appointments Commission (JAC) to become more open and transparent.

Keep ReadingShow less
Sunita-Williams-Reuters

Sunita Williams was part of the SpaceX Crew-9 mission and had been stranded in space for over nine months. (Photo: Reuters)

Reuters)

India looks amazing from space, says Sunita Williams

NASA astronaut Sunita Williams described India as "amazing" from space and expressed her intention to visit her "father's home country" to share her experiences on space exploration.

Speaking at a press conference on Monday, she responded to a question about how India appeared from space and the possibility of collaboration with the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO).

Keep ReadingShow less
british-muslims-iStock

The study noted that this identification was not due to any doctrinal obligation but was influenced by the perception that many Muslims do not feel fully accepted as British. (Representational image: iStock)

iStock

Majority of British Muslims identify by faith first, study finds

A STUDY by the Institute for the Impact of Faith in Life (IIFL) has found that most British Muslims identify primarily with their religion rather than their nationality.

The research, based on a survey of 815 British Muslim adults by Whitestone Insight, revealed that 71 per cent of respondents identified as Muslim first, while 27 per cent identified as British, English, or Scottish first.

Keep ReadingShow less