Days after a building collapse killed seven in Delhi, police have arrested the one of the operators of the boys paying guest (PG) accommodation being run in Satya Niketan area of the national capital.
The five-floor building was being operated by two business partners who had taken the property on lease in August 2025. One of the operators, identified as Sudhanshu, was apprehended on Wednesday morning. The other is still on the run.
According to a rent agreement, shared by the arrested owner’s son, who is also in police custody, the two PG operators were identified as Shubham Tyagi and Sudhanshu. Both the operators belonged to Uttar Pradesh originally.
Earlier, police apprehended labour contractor Sanoj who was allegedly supervising the “repair” work in the basement of the building, which allegedly resulted in the collapse.
As many as seven people, including five students, lost their lives on Sunday afternoon as the building came crumbling to the ground.
“The basement floor was being repaired as the waste was getting accumulated during the rainy season for the past 8-10 days. The ground floor was being repaired for extension for commercial purposes,” said deputy commissioner of police (south west) Amit Goel.
Satya Niketan PG owners in judicial custody
Delhi Police arrested the owners, 81-year-old Hariram Bansal, his 75-year-old wife Urmila Gupta, and 52-year-old son Mahesh Gupta, from Rajasthan’s Bhiwadi on Monday. Bansal and his wife were sent to 14-day judicial custody. His son, whom police said administered the building, was sent to two-day police custody.
During interrogation, Mahesh shared the rent agreement made between his mother, the building owner, and two PG operators. The two men were operating the PG under the name Hostel Daze. “At least three more PGs under the same name had been operating in the neighbourhood until the collapse,” said one officer aware of the details of the investigation.
The probe has revealed that there were seven rooms spread across four floors — two each on the first, second, and third floors, and one on the fourth floor which had been partially converted into a single-room accommodation for three students. The building’s ground floor had two shops and a basement, the officer said.
