Tragedy has befallen on noted criminal lawyer Rizwan Merchant, whose 13-year-old Faraaz, wife Asifa and mother Tahira were among the 10 persons killed in the collapse of Altaf Mansion building at Mahim in South-central Mumbai on Monday night. Apart from the bereavement, he has another reason to be crestfallen today.
For, as a long-time resident of the 30-year-old Altaf Mansion, Merchant had on behalf of fellow residents of the ill-fated structure had taken up cudgels against a car dealer who had allegedly carried out major illegal structural alterations at his showroom located on the ground floor of the building. Ironically enough, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) had not acted on the complaints lodged by Merchant with it against the owner of the ground floor space.
No wonder that the ground floor of Rizwan Mansion — housing a car showroom — caved in, leading to the collapse of the upper portions of the building. local residents say that Merchant had written two letters to the BMC about the “illegal alternations” being carried out by the car showroom dealer whom the ground floor owner Altaf Furniturewala had leased the ground floor space to. However, the BMC kept quiet.
Owing to the lack of initiative to redress his grievance and avert Monday’s tragedy that saw his son, wife and mother die suffocating death under the debris of the collapsed building, Merchant is naturally aggrieved.
What has shaken him to the hilt is the fact that despite having been in t0uch with his son Faraaz -- who had been trapped under the debris of Altaf Mansion that caved in on Monday night - on his cell phone for several hours, he could not save him. Sometime around Tuesday morning, Faraaz stopped responding to calls from his father.
While the bodies of Merchant’s wife and mother were recovered from under the debris of the collapsed building first, Faraaz’s body was recovered at 11 am on Tuesday. However, till Faraaz’s body was recovered, Merchant was hoping against hope that his son would be alive.
“My son was so cold. I held him in my arms, but he stayed immobile. How can I live without him (Faraaz). He was the dearest in the family,” said Merchant, who has represented actor Sanjay Dutt in the 1993 bomb blast case.
Merchants’ family had just returned from a holiday in Turkey. Rizwan, who had been to Turkey, had returned earlier. He was in office with his older son Faiz and daughter Fiza when he heard the news of the house collapse.
In his hour of grief, the only consolation was the family’s two parrots -- kept in a cage - survived the tragedy. They were rescued unhurt by the fire brigade personnel on Tuesday. Following the mishap, Merchants have moved temporarily to a relative’s place to the neighbouring suburb of Bandra.