Chandigarh, March 12 Union Minister Sanjay Seth handed over cheques of Rs 20 lakh each to the families of seven workers who died after a pile of soil collapsed on them at a construction site in Gurugram on Thursday.
Gurugram Deputy Commissioner Ajay Kumar said that each family would also receive an additional Rs 4 lakh from the Haryana government's Building and Other Construction Workers (BOCW) Welfare Fund, and another Rs 15 lakh under the Workmen Compensation Act.
This would mean that each family would receive a total financial assistance of approximately Rs 40 lakh, he said.
Six of the workers were from Jharkhand, while one was from Rajasthan. The accident occurred at the construction site in Sidhrawali village of Gurugram district on Monday evening.
The Haryana government also announced that each family would receive an additional Rs 20,000 to cover their travel expenses.
Seth arrived in Gurugram late Wednesday evening along with Jamshedpur MP Bidyut Baran Mahato from Jharkhand.
Seth, the Minister of State for Defence, met the bereaved families at the PWD Rest House in Gurugram on Thursday and offered his condolences.
The Gurugram district administration has facilitated a dialogue between the affected families and representatives of the concerned company, he said.
"Today, I revisited the site and arranged for the mortal remains of all the deceased to be transported to Jharkhand and Rajasthan in three ambulances," the Union Minister said.
Seven labourers died and four others, including three Nepalese men, were injured when a pile of soil collapsed on them while they were building a retaining wall of a sewerage treatment plant on Monday.
Police had arrested the project in-charge Dineshveer and the site structure in-charge Vikas. The district administration had also set up an inquiry committee to investigate the matter.