Five people were injured when a four-storey under-construction building collapsed in north Delhi's Azad market on Friday morning, officials said.
The fire department received a call about the incident at 8.30 am. Police reached the spot and found that some people were already rescued and sent to Hindu Rao hospital, a senior police officer said.
Deputy Commissioner of Police (north) Sagar Singh Kalsi said no one was staying in the building which may have collapsed due to overloading.
The injured have been identified as Congresh Yadav (31), Nitesh Yadav (29) and Amarjeet Yadav (21), all residents of Khagaria district in Bihar, and Azizur Rehman (44) and Jamil (45), both residents of Sheesh Mahal in Azad Market, police said.
They said Nitesh and Jamil have received major injuries.
Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal tweeted, "This accident is extremely saddening. Relief and rescue work is going on. I am receiving information from the district administration."
National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) teams, along with officials of MCD, fire and police departments were deployed for the rescue operation.
The owner of the building has been identified as Ajay Kumar Jain, a resident of Rajinder Nagar, and the builder is Mohammad Muzaffir, a resident of Takiya Rajan Mohalla in Azad Market, the DCP said.
A case under IPC sections 288 (negligent conduct with respect to pulling down or repairing buildings), 337 (causing hurt by act endangering life or personal safety of others) and 34 (common intention) has been registered, he said.
The Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD), in a statement, said permission was granted for the construction of the ground floor, first floor, second floor and third floor. "At the time of inspection, no deviation/excess coverage was noticed at the site."
Prima facie, it was found that substandard material was used for its construction. There was a heavy load of construction material on the building which led to its collapse, it said, adding the exact cause can be ascertained only after the debris is removed.
An NDRF official, who was present at the spot, said, "The narrow lane has made the rescue operation difficult for the authorities. We can not deploy big machines here as we do not have enough space."
Congresh Yadav, who was admitted to the orthopaedic department of the Hindu Rao Hospital, said he was working at the site for the last two to three months.
"We work the night shift from 12 am to 10 am. Around 8 am, we were on the third floor of the building when it collapsed," he said.
Another injured, Azizur Rehman, was returning home after dropping his child to school when the building collapsed and he got buried in the debris to his neck, his brother-in-law Mohammad Nadeem said.
Another injured Amarjeet said, "Our shift was about to end when the incident happened."