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Updated: Jun 29, 2019 15:30 IST

A pall of gloom descended on Bihar’s Baghar, Baisbighi and Daliyan villages under Balrampur police station of Katihar district as the news of deaths of at least 12 labourers in Pune reached here in the wee hours of Saturday.

The deceased, who were working in a construction company, were sleeping when the wall of an under-construction building collapsed on their temporary houses built at a construction site in Kondhwa in Maharashtra’s Pune.

The 12 migrant labourers were among the 15 killed in the Pune wall collapse incident.

Bihar chief minister Nitish Kumar has expressed shock over the incident and has announced an ex-gratia payment of Rs 2 lakh to the bereaved families and Rs 50,000 to the injured.

“We’ll render all possible help to the bereaved families,” Katihar JD-U MP Dulal Chandra Goswami, who comes from Balrampur, said while expressing deep anguish over the deaths.

The deceased have been identified as Mohan Sharma, 30, Alok Sharma, 26, Ravi Sharma, 15 (from Baisbighi village), Pichhora Sharma, 18, Deep Ranjan Sharma, 35, Nibha Sharma, 30, Indra Jeet Sharma, 10, Rajiv Sharma, 7 (from Daliyan village), Bheema Das, 28, Sangeeta Devi, 27, Sonali Das, 8, Abhijit Das, 3 (From Baghar village).

The entire family of Bheema Das was killed in the incident.

Migration for jobs to other states is a routine affair in Bihar, where unemployment looms large and there are scarce job opportunities.

Most of the migrant labourers from Seemanchal and Kosi are engaged with building construction companies in several states including Maharashtra, Delhi, Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir.

“We had never thought that tragedy will strike us in such a big way. The incident has left us shattered,” Ram Narayan Sharma of Baisbighi village said, adding “If we don’t migrate, arranging two square meals a day would be impossible for us. The incident exposes the vicious circle of poverty in our villages.”