Rescue workers look for survivors at the site of a collapsed building at R.P.Road in Secunderabad.

 The death toll in the City Light building collapse has risen to 17 with four more bodies recovered from the debris on Tuesday. The number of injured remains to be 18.

The victims were identified as tea master of the hotel, Venkatesh hailing from Khammam district and Kiran of Siddipet in Medak district. The second victim was also a worker of the hotel. The debris removal work and rescue operations, which started within an hour of the building collapse on Monday morning, continued all through the night.

The disaster management experts from National Industrial Security Academy rescued an injured person Kamalakar a little after Monday midnight. On Tuesday morning, they found the bodies of Venkatesh and Kiran. The bodies were shifted to the Gandhi hospital morgue for performing autopsy.

The rescue teams acted with caution in removal of the debris as even an iota of negligence in moving the huge concrete slab blocks would endanger lives of those still trapped inside. Meanwhile, family members of the hotel owner Syed Hasan Ali continued to wait at the building collapse site hoping to find his nephew Ali Kirmani who was missing since the building caved in the previous day. Mr. Kirmani was reportedly inside the kitchen of the hotel when the building crumbled.

Keywords: City Light hotel disaster, rescue operations, City Light Hotel deaths, National Industrial Security Academy

Source: The Hindu