Broken windows dangling from the upper floors, plaster peeling off walls, a mesh of overhead wires, and hungry stray dogs in the abandoned corridors — this is the condition of Delhi’s beloved, though infamous, Ghaffar market.

The five-storey MCD market in Karol Bagh, which is home to a row of shops that sell cheap mobile phone parts, accessories, and other electronics, is crumbling. Over two years ago, multiples notices were slapped on the walls of the market by the erstwhile North MCD warning “consumers, occupiers and owners” to vacate the premises within three days over safety concerns.

The notice was issued under Section 349 of The Delhi Municipal Corporation Act, 1957, but since then, neither have people vacated the building, nor has it been repaired by the MCD.

A trader, on condition of anonymity, told HT, “We have to stay here despite everything as it’s a matter of livelihood. The tarpaulin sheet we use on top of our makeshift shop doubles up as a way of catching any piece that might scrape off from the floors above.”

All 75 shops are on the ground floor. The top four floors, which once housed banks, export centres and offices, were vacated 10 years ago, and are now in a constant state of deterioration. The trader said, “The MCD should repair or retrofit the building as soon as possible.” Despite repeated attempts, MCD did not respond to queries regarding cracks in the building, relocation of shops or retrofitting the building complex.

On November 1, HT did a spot check and found glaring structural problems that can, perhaps, one day lead to catastrophic consequences.

Risky business

The July 23, 2021 notice was based on a structural audit of the building carried out by IIT, Roorkee, that year. The audit report flagged that active corrosion had been reported in the building, especially in the basement floor — which meant that any maintenance done without stopping corrosion would be futile. Despite the alarm, traders resisted vacating Ghaffar Market, and approached the district court for stay. MCD had, in the meantime, floated the proposal to redevelop and relocate the market to three alternative sites.

Traders say MCD’s attempt to vacate the stay have not been accepted by the district court.

Over two years later, however, the notices have gone missing from walls, and customers continue to flock to Ghaffar market.

Ritesh Ahuja, 27, a college student said the market building clearly appears to be in need of repair. “Ghaffar has the cheapest phone accessories. You can get any fault on mobile phones repaired at low cost. Customers come here briefly but traders are themselves at risk. The building is clearly in poor shape,” he added.

Ghaffar Market, named after freedom fighter Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan, first opened its doors as a single-storey market in 1952, and was home to shops that sold jewellery, crockery, toys and shoes.

Now, it is known as a hub for electronics and gained notoriety as a “grey market” where fake gadgets sold for cheaper rates, and police raids were common.

In 1976, shops were given by MCD on Saraswati Marg on lease for 99 years. As decay set it, MCD planned redevelopment on a public-private partnership basis. “MCD’s aim was to build a mall here and get us all to vacate the shops. It made such attempts in 2011 and 2016,” said Harish Chitkara, market association president. Chitkara said despite paying 10% licensing fee as maintenance charges, MCD failed to carry out regular maintenance.

“There is no effort being made to strengthen the structure. They just want to build a mall and are deliberately allowing the structure to deteriorate,” Chitakara said.

He added the traders had secured a stay on vacating the building in 2021. “We have written several letters demanding the eviction of illegal vendors from the market, and to request repair but no heed has been paid,” he said.

The state of Ghaffar Market also tells the tale of the slow progress made in improving the structural safety and earthquake preparedness in the capital. In the last one month, the city has witnessed at least six aftershocks from earthquakes, but the “structural earthquake safety orders” issued by the Delhi high court have not been fully implemented.

In June 2020, acting on the Delhi HC directions, the three erstwhile municipal corporations had fixed a deadline of six months to obtain a structural safety certificate for high-risk buildings as well as the older structures which came up before the seismic provisions were incorporated in the building bye-laws of Delhi. Ghaffar market had been identified as high risk building in July 2021.

So far, 1,521 buildings have been identified as high-risk, and over three years later, only 1,137 have been audited, and retro fitting is being carried out in just 39 of them. MCD had roped in the department of earthquake engineering for structural audit of the building in 2021. It carried out rebound hammer test, ultrasonic pulse velocity test, half cell potentiometer test, Vernier calliper test based on which reports were submitted on July 5, 2021 and July 16, 2021 with observations such as “average compressive strength is not satisfactory”, “quality of columns may be doubtful”, “active corrosion in building”, “loss of integrity of core concrete due to presence of cracks.” The building is still lying in tatters with several parts of lantern crumbling. No retrofitting has been carried out.

The Tejendra Khanna Committee — set up in 2006 to probe unauthorised construction — had reported at least 70-80% of an estimated 3.2 million structures in Delhi violated building norms.

In vulnerable zone

Delhi falls under the seismic zone-4 and is prone to the second highest level of earthquakes. Despite the repeated interventions of the Delhi HC, the urban local bodies have been slow in ensuring structural safety compliances.

According to a June 2022 public notice, the erstwhile North, South and East MCD made it mandatory for all institutional buildings — with large number of occupants, such as educational institutes, assembly buildings, hospitals, malls, cinema halls and hospitals — to undertake structural safety audit and carry out retrofitting if the audit highlights its need.

“For the buildings which have sanctioned building plans, the cut-off date of March 20, 2001 was fixed for obtaining structural safety certificate, and safety audit was also mandated for older buildings,” an MCD official said.

Arpit Bhargava, the petitioner in the case, said the series of earthquakes in the region should wake the authorities. “They were slow to make an action plan and despite the Delhi HC pushing it, the implementation has been even slower. Of the 3.2 million buildings, only 1,100 have been retrofitted,” he said. MCD’s action-taken report says that 4,571 notices were issued and retrofitting audit were received in 1,137 cases.

An MCD official told HT that the scale of construction that has been undertaken without following the unified building bye-laws is so huge that it poses practical problems in ensuring compliance. “In many cases, we have issued notice but people do not respond. If harsh actions such as cutting power or water supply are taken, there is public outcry,” he added.