From Satya Niketan to Saidulajab: Why Does MCD Keep Looking Away as Buildings Collapse?

Delhi Building Collapse: Six people are dead after a five-storey paying-guest accommodation collapsed in Delhi’s Satya Niketan on Sunday, trapping residents and workers under the rubble. According to the Municipal Corporation of Delhi’s preliminary assessment, the property had no sanctioned building plan for the existing structure, unauthorised construction in its basement and no fire NOC. Yet the report also said there was no record of the property having been booked or sealed before the collapse.

That gap has once again put the civic body’s building-safety enforcement under scrutiny. Delhi Fire Services received 76 calls related to house collapses between January and May this year, according to data cited by Hindustan Times. There were 544 such calls in 2025 and 464 in 2024. Separately, 46 people died in building collapses between January 2024 and December 2025. The two datasets measure different things, but both point to a recurring problem.

Delhi has rules to deal with unsafe construction. The question is whether they are being enforced before a building collapses rather than after it.

Satya Niketan shows what went unchecked

The collapsed property, P-14 in Satya Niketan, stood on a roughly 55-square-yard plot and had a basement and four floors, according to the MCD report cited by Hindustan Times. The civic body also said construction in the basement was unauthorised. The building was being used as a PG accommodation but did not have a fire NOC, according to the MCD.

Repair and renovation work was reportedly taking place before the collapse. The Indian Express reported that additional floors, repair work in the basement and ground floor, and inadequate safety checks were among the issues being examined. The precise structural cause, however, has not yet been established.

The MCD record is more straightforward. The corporation said it had no record of the property being booked or sealed and no complaint about work at the site.

That does not establish that an MCD official knew the building was dangerous and deliberately ignored it. It does establish that the corporation had no recorded enforcement action against a property it now says contained unauthorised construction.

The problem may extend beyond the collapsed building. After the incident, a neighbouring PG was found to be in a dilapidated condition and was evacuated and sealed, according to The Indian Express. Residents told the that Satya Niketan had seen four such incidents in roughly 15 years. The last major one, in 2022, killed two people.

Satya Niketan has also changed considerably from the low-rise residential neighbourhood it was designed to be. The Indian Express reported that many of its small plots have been converted into PG accommodation and private hostels catering to students from Delhi University’s South Campus.

Saidulajab shows what happened when warnings were already on record

A clearer example of an enforcement failure comes from another recent collapse.

On May 30, six people were killed when a building in Saidulajab near Saket Metro station collapsed. Before the disaster, Delhi Police had flagged ongoing illegal construction at the property to the MCD on two occasions in March, according to The Indian Express. The building was originally four storeys, while additional floors were being constructed.

A status report submitted to the Supreme Court went further. Senior Advocate Ajit Kumar Sinha, assisting the court as amicus curiae in a case concerning illegal construction, said the MCD had been aware of unauthorised construction at the property since 2015 but had taken no concrete action. The report said the violations had continued despite the corporation’s statutory responsibilities.

A separate magisterial inquiry into the collapse also raised questions about the MCD’s conduct. Hindustan Times reported that the inquiry found serious lapses in the civic body’s handling of illegal construction and that it could not produce evidence of inspection or preventive action after a complaint received in March. The inquiry also questioned inspection records that appeared to have been prepared after the collapse.

The Saidulajab case is different from Satya Niketan. In Satya Niketan, the MCD says there was no previous booking or sealing record. In Saidulajab, authorities had received warnings about illegal construction before the building fell.

That distinction is important because it shows two possible points of failure: construction that remains outside the approved system without recorded enforcement, and violations that are brought to the authorities’ attention without timely action.

Delhi has had structural-safety rules for years

The city has also had court-directed mechanisms to identify older and potentially high-risk buildings.

In 2020, following directions from the Delhi High Court, the three erstwhile municipal corporations set a six-month deadline for structural safety certificates for specified categories of high-risk and older buildings, including structures built before seismic provisions were incorporated into Delhi’s building bye-laws.

Six years later, the compliance figures remain limited.

According to figures reported by Hindustan Times, the MCD identified 4,762 high-risk and old structures and issued notices to 4,571. Structural audit reports were received for only 1,155, with demolition being carried out in 56 cases and retrofitting in 47. Those numbers do not mean that every building without an audit is unsafe, or that every notified structure should have been demolished. They do show a substantial gap between identifying buildings for scrutiny and completing structural audits or remedial action.

The MCD has cited difficulties including non-response from property owners and the scale of unauthorised construction in older neighbourhoods and unauthorised colonies. But the central issue remains what happens after a building is identified.

An unfortunate cycle keeps repeating

Delhi has seen deadly building collapses for years.

In April 2025, 11 people, including four children, died in a building collapse in Mustafabad. Another collapse a month later killed six people, including a toddler, while seven people died in a collapse in Jaitpur’s Hari Nagar area in August, according to Hindustan Times. The newspaper recorded 46 deaths from building collapses between January 2024 and December 2025.

The most serious historical reminder remains the November 2010 Lalita Park collapse, when a five-storey building fell, killing 70 people and injuring 77. Nearly eight years later, the concerned junior engineer was penalised with a fine of just ₹21,000, Hindustan Times reported.

There have also been repeated enforcement drives after disasters. Following the Saidulajab collapse and the Hauz Rani fire in June, MCD launched a citywide crackdown. The Indian Express reported that 82 properties had been demolished and 43 sealed by June 5.

After the Satya Niketan collapse, the MCD has again ordered action against illegal structures above four floors, while warning that officials found responsible for allowing violations could face action.

That response may address immediate risks. But it brings the city back to the same question: why does enforcement so often gather pace after a collapse?