Noose tightens on Chintels Paradiso builders after last week’s mishap

CM tells them to bear structure-audit costs; Residents begin relay hunger strike

Gurugram, Feb. 15 (Delhi Crown): Noose seems to be tightening on Chintels Paradiso builders as they have been told to bear all the costs the state government would incur in carrying out the structure-audits of Tower-D at which multiple vertical crashes had taken place on Feb. 10 claiming lives of two women.

The shocking vertical collapses at Chintels Paradiso in Sector-109 were unprecedented in the country’s real estate history.

Residents of Chintels Paradiso have begun a relay hunger strike demanding a probe by no less than CBI sleuths, and a structural audit by experts from IIT-Delhi.

It is learnt that Gurugram’s Department of Town and Country Planning (DTCP) has written a letter to the Director, IIT-Delhi, to provide consultancy services and carry out a structural audit of the housing society to find out the flaws in its design and overall construction.

The specialists of IIT-Delhi’s Civil Engineering department are expected to probe whether the building is fit for living or not. Depending on the findings of probe by IIT-Delhi, the fate of the building (Tower-D) will be decided, even as all residents who own flats/condominiums in Tower-D have been rendered homeless.

District Town Planner (Enforcement) met enraged residents on Monday in a bid to plan their temporary resettlement in other flats lying vacant in the housing society. There are around 40 families having residential units in the damaged Tower-D, out of whom 19 are flat owners and rest tenants.

Personal belongings of the affected residents are being shifted to alternative flats within the society, while the heavy items like beds and other furniture would be provided by the builder company.

Meanwhile, consenting to bear the costs of structural audit(s) of the building, the Chintels Paradiso’s builders said – “We request the authorities for assistance so that we can get our residents back to their homes in a safe and secure environment.”

In a related development, the state government has decided to engage the local DTCP in carrying on a simultaneous structural analysis of multi-storey residential buildings in Gurugram with the help of either the government institutions or empanelled engineers, before granting Occupation Certificates (OC) to the builders.

The process of granting OCs to Chintels Paradiso has come under scanner even as the residents living there have been continuously complaining about the poor quality of construction, ever since they shifted to their newly purchased housing units five years ago.

After the mishap, the Chintels group had claimed in a statement that a reputed construction firm – Bhayana Builders had built the housing society using “materials of highest quality”.