Deadly Building Collapses Hit India’s West

Amit Dave/Reuters

A victim of the collapse of two adjacent apartment buildings was removed on Wednesday.

VADODARA, India â€" Two adjacent apartment buildings collapsed early Wednesday in western India, killing at least 11 people, the police and firefighters said.

Rescue workers pulled 11 bodies and 4 severely injured people from the debris of the three-story buildings that fell in the city of Vadodara in Gujarat State, said the fire chief, Hitesh Taparia.

Most of the occupants of the 14 apartments in the first building were sleeping when it collapsed. The adjacent building was evacuated minutes before it fell, said a police officer, Bhanu Pratap Parmar.

The two buildings were part of 33 housing blocks constructed by the Gujarat government more than a decade ago to house the poor.

More than 250 rescue workers were trying to clear debris from the site and search for survivors in the mountain of twisted metal, concrete slabs, bricks and mortar.

Chief Taparia said the cause of the collapse was not immediately clear.

Police officials said there had been unusually heavy rain in Vadodara during the monsoon season and it could have damaged the buildings’ foundations.

The Gujarat government has ordered an investigation and will check for structural damage in the 31 other buildings in the complex, Mr. Taparia said.

Building collapses are common in India as builders cut corners by using substandard materials, and as multistory structures are often built with inadequate supervision.

Extensive demand for housing around India’s cities and pervasive corruption often result in builders adding unauthorized floors or putting up illegal buildings.

A version of this article appears in print on August 29, 2013, on page A8 of the New York edition with the headline: Deadly Building Collapses Hit India’s West.