MCD suspends 3 building department engineers after Satya Niketan PG collapse

MCD has made it clear that any negligence or dereliction of duty by officials in dealing with unauthorised construction will not be tolerated.

The Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) has placed three officials of its building department under suspension with immediate effect for dereliction of duty and negligence in the discharge of their official responsibilities regarding action against unauthorised construction.

As per the orders issued by the MCD on Thursday, Ravinder Kumar, Assistant Engineer (AE) in building department, South West zone (erstwhile Najafgarh Zone), has been placed under suspension as per applicable rules.

Suman Saurabh and Mohit Yadav, who work as junior engineers in the same department and zone, have also been suspended with immediate effect.

The action has been taken in view of dereliction of duty and negligence on the part of the officials, in accordance with the applicable service rules and orders of the competent authority.

MCD has made it clear that any negligence or dereliction of duty by officials in dealing with unauthorised construction will not be tolerated. The Corporation has directed its field-level officials to remain vigilant and ensure timely action against violations in accordance with the prescribed rules and procedures.

The MCD has reiterated that strict accountability will be maintained at all levels and that officials found failing to discharge their duties properly will be liable for action as per applicable rules.

The Corporation will continue to take necessary enforcement and administrative measures to ensure compliance with building norms and to prevent unauthorised construction across Delhi.

Shishir Gupta is Executive Editor at Hindustan Times and one of India's top journalists covering national security, strategic affairs, foreign policy and geopolitics. Over the past three decades, he has extensively reported on India's military, diplomatic and security landscape, covering every major conflict and national security challenge, from the 1999 Kargil War and the 2020 East Ladakh standoff to Operation Sindoor in 2025. He has also covered major terror attacks, including the IC-814 hijacking, the 26/11 Mumbai attacks and the 2025 Pahalgam terror strike, along with numerous Pakistan-backed terrorist incidents in the Kashmir Valley and across India. He has reported on national and state elections for more than three decades. A recognised authority on strategic affairs, Gupta has covered India's nuclear programme since the Pokhran-II (Shakti series) tests in May 1998 and has written extensively on global nuclear issues, Indian diplomacy and the country's expanding global outreach. He has also reported widely on international conflicts and terrorism, with a special focus on the Indian subcontinent. Gupta has interviewed Prime Minister Narendra Modi more than four times, including Modi's first interview with the print media after becoming Prime Minister in May 2014. His other interviews include three with the Dalai Lama, as well as conversations with Benjamin Netanyahu, Amit Shah, Yogi Adityanath, S. Jaishankar, Nirmala Sitharaman and Piyush Goyal. He is the author of Indian Mujahideen: The Enemy Within (Hachette, 2011) and Himalayan Face-off: Chinese Assertion and Indian Riposte (Hachette, 2014). He was awarded the Chevening-Wolfson Joint Scholarship at Wolfson College, University of Cambridge, UK, in 1998 and participated in the International Visitor Leadership Program (IVLP) of the US State Department in 2006. He received the Ben Gurion Prize from Israel in 2011 and the K. Subrahmanyam Prize for Strategic Studies in 2015 from the Manohar Parrikar Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses (MP-IDSA). Since 2024, he has hosted Point Blank, Hindustan Times' weekly YouTube show on global geopolitics.Read More