Bihar: A portion of a newly-constructed bridge in India’s eastern state of Bihar collapsed before it could formally be opened to the public. A piece of the bridge, built over the Burhi Gandak river in the state’s Begusarai district, snapped and fell into the water on Sunday morning. According to officials, a crack was spotted in the 206m-long bridge, following which vehicles were barred from crossing it. There have been no casualties or injuries in the collapse as there was no one on the bridge at the time of the incident. Construction of the bridge began in 2016 and it was built at a cost of Rs 134m (approximately £1.3m) under a state government scheme.

 

Pictures and videos on social media showed two big chunks of the bridge floating on river water. It is estimated that the bridge, meant to open access between two local areas, would have helped nearly 30,000 access the national highway easily. Local residents will now have to reportedly take a boat ride or cover a distance of more than 20km through the next district. The local administration has ordered an inquiry into the collapse following an inspection by a team of engineers from the state’s rural works department.

 

Roshan Kushwaha, Begusarai’s district magistrate, said the bridge was built by a local construction company and was often used by pedestrians. “Plying of small vehicles was also allowed,” he said. But he was also quoted as saying by the Indian Express newspaper that the administration’s “worst fears came true on Sunday when the portion of the bridge crashed into the river. ”Thankfully, nobody suffered physical harm when the huge chunk fell into the river,” he added.

 

The incident comes two months after at least 135 people died in a bridge collapse that took place in prime minister Narendra Modi’s home state of Gujarat – in one of India’s worst public safety tragedies. The 223m-long and 1.25m-wide suspension bridge in Gujarat’s Morbi collapsed just days after it reopened to the public after months of repair. Bihar, however, is no stranger to bridge collapses, with routine incidents highlighting the poor quality of construction work. In November, a daily wage labourer died and another sustained injury after a bridge under construction collapsed in the state’s Nalanda district.

 

In another incident in July, at least 10 labourers were injured after an under-construction bridge collapsed in the Katihar district. A portion of a 9.1km-long bridge constructed over eight years fell in the Gopalganj district less than a month after it was inaugurated by the state’s chief minister Nitish Kumar in July 2020.