A bridge being constructed over the Ganga river collapsed in Bihar’s Khagaria on Sunday, PTI reported.
A portion of the bridge had last collapsed on April 30 last year. The bridge, which will connect Khagaria with Bhagalpur, is being built at a cost of Rs 1,700 crore.
On Sunday, the Bihar government claimed that portions of the bridge were deliberately destroyed in a planned manner as it had design flaws, reported PTI.
“We had approached IIT-Roorkee, which is esteemed for its expertise in construction matters, to conduct a study,” Deputy Chief Minister Tejashwi Yadav said. “It is yet to come up with a final report but experts who had studied the structure had informed us that there were serious defects.”
The project, which began in 2014, was originally scheduled to complete by 2019. But, the deadline has been extended four times, according to The Indian Express.
Additional Chief Secretary of Road Construction Department Pratyay Amrit claimed that the state decided to go ahead with the demolition of the bridge without waiting for the final report.
“It was decided that we must not take any chance and wait for a final report,” he said, according to PTI. “So we went ahead with pulling down parts of the bridge. Today’s incident was a part of such a preventive exercise.”
Chief Minister Nitish Kumar said that bridge was not being constructed correctly and that is why it is collapsing. “The bridge that collapsed yesterday had collapsed last year also,” Kumar said, according to ANI. “I have instructed officials to take strict action.”
Circle Officer Chandan Kumar said that one person, who was working as a guard at the construction site, is missing.
“His body has not been recovered yet,” Kumar told ANI. “A search by State Disaster Response Force and National Disaster Response Force is underway to trace him.”
Meanwhile, the Bharatiya Janata Party, which is in Opposition, alleged there was “rampant corruption” under the rule of the Nitish Kumar-led Bihar government.
“Sub-standard materials were used for the construction of the bridge,” Bihar BJP president Samrat Choudhary said. “The CM [Nitish Kumar] is least bothered about the development of Bihar. He must resign from his post after this incident.”
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