Bihar's 10th bridge collapse: Issue attributed to design and cement

PATNA: A 15-year-old bridge across the Gandaki river in Baniapur block of Saran district collapsed on Sunday morning, making it the 10th bridge to fall down in north Bihar in the last fortnight. The first to crumble was in Sikti block of Araria district, bordering Nepal, on June 18.
The fear is that someday vehicles full of people might go crashing into the river along with the collapsing bridge, as in the case of the eight-lane bridge over the Mississippi in the US in August 2007 when cars and trucks fell into the river.
Unsurprisingly, RWD minister Ashok Chaudhary suspended three engineers in the earlier Araria bridge collapse, and an order has also been issued for the filing of an FIR against the contractor concerned since the bridge collapse prima facie was found to be the result of compromises at various levels of construction.
Saran saw a second bridge give way in the last 24 hours. "A bridge built in the colonial period had collapsed on Wednesday, and the second one, built 15 years ago by the district administration, suffered the same fate on Thursday," Saran DM Aman Samir said.
While Samir said no one died or was injured in both bridge collapses or the previous eight bridge collapses, structural engineers and experts said the series of incidents exposes deep-rooted corruption in construction of bridges in Bihar.
Former road construction department chief engineer J K Dutt said, "The basic causes are tinkering with the bridge design, use of sub-standard materials, like low-value cement, unspecified sand, concrete, and steel rods thinner than the approved diameter and thickness. All this leads to the construction or erection of poor and weak structures."
"The contractor engaged to build the bridge is driven by profit. He violates norms of quality work, but it cannot happen without the collusion of local government engineers with the contractor," a top contractor said on condition of anonymity. "The contractor has to have more than the approved saving since he has to pay commissions to government engineers, a part of which is distributed among the superiors," the contractor added.
The project values of three under-construction bridges that collapsed in north Bihar were Rs 12 crore for the one across Bakra river in Araria district, Rs 3 crore for the bridge across Bhutahi Balan river in Madhubani district, and Rs 1.5 crore for one in East Champaran district.
A district-wise break-up of collapsed bridges shows that one bridge came crashing down in Araria district, three in Siwan, two in Kishanganj, one each in Madhubani and East Champaran, and two in Saran.
One of the bridges that collapsed in Siwan was built with the MLA Local Area Development funds of Uma Shankar Singh, while the two bridges in Kishanganj were constructed with the MPLAD funds of Mohammad Taslimuddin, and the one in Maharajganj block, Siwan, with the MPLAD funds of Prabhunath Singh.
While high-value bridges are constructed by the road construction department (RCD), which takes care of the national highways (NH), state highways (SH) and major district roads (MDRs), the rural works department (RWD) handles the construction of roads and bridges under the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY) to provide connectivity to villages, linking them with block headquarters. All the bridges that have collapsed come under the RWD's ambit.
The frequency of the bridge collapses - even though most of them are old, barring the three that were under construction - have alarmed both the govt at the level of CM Nitish Kumar as well as retired engineers associated with Bihar Engineering Services Association (BESA) and others.