Owners didn’t engage ‘qualified’ persons for structural changes to Satya Niketan building: Cops

Delhi police has informed the Delhi High Court that the owners of the Satya Niketan building, which collapsed and killed seven people, did not hire "qualified" professionals for the structural changes they made to the property. The police report, filed on September 21 in response to a petition by a Delhi University law student, revealed that the building's operators, Hostel Daze, also neglected to take necessary precautions despite the construction work ongoing.

The accused owners, Urmila Gupta, her husband Hari Ram Gupta, and their son Mahesh Gupta, allegedly failed to obtain the necessary permissions for the structural modifications and even hired an unprofessional and unqualified contractor named Sanoj for the task. Moreover, Sanoj allegedly did not follow proper safety measures during the repair work and did not consult any qualified architect or structural expert before proceeding.

The police have also uncovered that the owners had not sought land-use conversion permissions, as they had been running Hostel Daze as a commercial venture without the required approvals.