KOLKATA, India-- Indian police said Friday they had detained five officials of the construction company that was building anoverpass in Kolkata that collapsed, killing 23 people.

Kolkata police said the five officials from IVRCL Infrastructure Co. were detained Friday for questioning about why the overpass fell in a busy neighborhood, leaving an enormous pile of concrete slabs and twisted metal rods.

Twenty-four people were killed and more than 80 injured in Thursday's disaster.

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Police also sealed the Kolkata office of IVRCL. The company signed a contract in 2007 to build the overpass, and was behind schedule.

Indian rescue workers and volunteers try to free people trapped under the wreckage of a collapsed flyover bridge in Kolkata on March 31, 2016. Getty

Earlier Friday, police said they were investigating company officials for alleged culpable homicide and criminal breach of trust.

Rescuers cleared the crumbled concrete and twisted metal rods a day after the collapse in the crowded area of the eastern Indian city. They have pulled out 67 people alive.

"There is no possibility of finding any person alive," said S.S. Guleria, deputy inspector general of the India's National Disaster Response Force. He said engineers were being consulted about part of the overpass still hanging over the disaster area, after which workers will "slowly start dismantling this particular section to avoid any collateral damage to houses around it."

The images from the scene of the disaster were shocking: massive fallen steel girders, taxis crumpled under slabs of concrete, a crushed truck, destroyed rickshaws and dozens of people trapped.

But what followed was more or less routine in the country of 1.3 billion.

The chief minister of West Bengal state blamed the building company and the previous government that had commissioned the project. Other officials shot back by accusing her of playing politics.

The builders, meanwhile, expressed surprise, calling the accident "an act of God."

Tragic accidents from failing infrastructure, some of it old and some just being built, have occurred regularly as India undergoes a breakneck construction boom. Many projects are mired in messy delays and allegations of corruption. Others are marred by poor quality materials, inadequate supervision, poor safety standards for workers or the outright flouting of building codes.

A general view of the collapsed flyover in Kolkata, India, March 31, 2016. REUTERS

Construction of the Vivekanand overpass in the northern part of the state capital of Kolkata was expected to be finished in two years when the contract was signed in 2007 with Hyderabad-based IVRCL Infrastructure. But no one was surprised when the company overshot both its budget and several deadlines.

Here are some other major construction accidents in India in recent years.

April 2013: At least 74 people were killed when an under-construction building collapsed in Thane, a western Indian suburb of Mumbai.

November 2010: A poorly built residential building toppled in a crowded part of the Indian capital, killing 65 people.

September 2010: Shortly before India was to host the Commonwealth Games, a suspension bridge outside a stadium crashed onto the road beneath it, injuring 27 workers. The accident became a symbol of the chaos that surrounds India's preparations for the sporting event.

July 2009: Five workers were crushed to death and 13 others were injured when a section of a bridge being built to carry Delhi's metro trains collapses in a residential neighborhood.