A portion of a bridge on NH 16 collapses

By Akshya Rout

Jajpur,July 18 : A portion of a 15 year old bridge  on the National Highway 16  near  Rasulpur block in Jajpur district  collapsed on Tuesday  morning   . No injuries or fatalities have been reported as luck would have it , no vehicle was plying at that time on the bridge. 

Serious questions were raised over the quality of the construction  carried out by  the  National Highway Autority of India (NHAI) and construction company  after a span of the bridge caved in .

Irate over the incident , many locals alleged poor quality of construction works as the reason behind the incident. Though the incident did not cause any casualty and major mishap, the locals have demanded stringent action against erring   officials of NHAI and the construction company.

  When contacted   J. P  Verma  the Project Director of NHAI, Chandikhola said “The bridge was built in 2008  and it’s  life span is 50 years.   After knowing about the incident , I along with other officials rushed to the spot. Prima facie we are yet to know why this happened. But it looks like a structural failure.  A Technical team will soon arrive  to investigate  the reason behind the incident’.

 After the collapse of the bridge  vehicular movement was stopped on one side of the National Highway-16 connecting Chennai and Kolkata.

 Jajpur MP and BJD leader Sarmistha Sethi ,Senior Congress leader and former minister Sarat Rout blamed large scale corruption  and irregularities as the reasons behind the collapse of the bridge.