IIT Guwahati has written to the state government to confirm that it is willing to undertake the third party audit into the collapse of the dome at the under-construction new Assembly building.
The dome collapsed on Sunday. As the incident occurred at around midnight, there were, thankfully, no workers on site and therefore no casualties.
The state government has been under huge pressure over the collapse, though, with questions raised about the design, construction and what oversight the Public Works Department (Buildings) gave.
Several institutes were asked whether they were willing to conduct the audit, out of which IIT Guwahati has responded positively, Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma informed today.
He reiterated the government’s stance that it is too premature to blame anyone or suspend anyone for the disaster. There have been calls for the PWD engineer in charge, Ransom Sutnga, to be suspended and for the minister, Dasakhiatbha Lamare, to resign or be sacked but no action has been taken.
A team from IIT Guwahati is expected to arrive in the next couple of days for an inspection. The CM assured that the audit will be completely independent.
Sangma repeated what he said a few days ago that the project is a challenging one and that, sometimes, such collapses do occur.
“Let the inquiry come and we will have a clear picture,” he added.