New Delhi: A 42-year-old woman and her 17-year-old son were killed while two labourers were injured after a portion of a boundary wall collapsed following heavy rain in north Delhi’s Sehgal Colony on Tuesday morning. All four were working at a construction site about 100 metres from the LG Secretariat.The deceased were identified as Meera and her son Ganpat, both residents of Dharmapura, Chhatarpur, in Madhya Pradesh. Among the injured are Meera’s elder son Dashrath (19), who is critical, and her brother-in-law Nanhe (35), who sustained a leg injury and is stated to be stable. According to police, a PCR call about the wall collapse was received at 9.40am. “Four labourers were found trapped under debris; all were rescued and taken to hospital, where two were declared dead,” said a senior police officer.The victims, who were working at the site at House No. 1, Sehgal Colony around 9-9.30am, had also erected a small temporary shack for shelter. They were engaged in daily work when the eastern boundary wall of an adjacent plot on Court Road suddenly gave way and collapsed.Initial investigation revealed that no reinforcement or safety measures had been put in place at the adjacent site, where a housing project was underway. The collapse sent a cascade of debris crashing into the labourers’ shack at Plot No. 1. It also damaged House No. 7B, Sehgal Colony, located directly across the lane. Several elderly residents of the house had a narrow escape, as chunks of the wall smashed through portions of their home.“The wall was part of the side boundary of the apartment project at Plot No. 7, Court Road. Its collapse caused widespread damage across adjacent properties,” the officer said.Local residents blamed an ongoing housing project, widespread tree cutting, and a lack of structural integrity for the collapse. According to them, the incident was a disaster waiting to happen.Deepak Khanna, the 78-year-old resident of House No. 7B, told TOI, “With so much rain and no proper support structure, it was only a matter of time before something like this happened. The wall of our house, built in 1964, thankfully held up and did not collapse along with it.”Standing amid the rubble, another resident pointed to the broken debris and scattered loose soil, saying, “At this rate, even the tin shed covering the construction site might fall. Anyone could get hurt.”Referring to the housing project, he alleged, “With the drilling and the number of old trees they have cut for this purpose — about 30 — the land has become completely unstable.”A case has been registered under sections 290 (negligent conduct with respect to pulling down, repairing or constructing buildings), 125 (act endangering life or personal safety of others) and 106 (death due to negligence) of BNS at Civil Lines police station.