A preliminary inquiry into Thursday’s Foot Over Bridge (FOB) collapse that claimed six lives and left 30 others injured, has found that the structural audit of the FOB that certified that the ill-fated bridge was in a “good condition” had been conducted in an “irresponsible and negligent” manner and recommended criminal action against a private structural auditor.

A day after a major portion of the FOB connecting the platforms of the Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj Terminus (CSMT) to the lane leading to the Azad Maidan crashed, a preliminary inquiry report submitted the Brihanmunicipal Corporation’s Chief Engineer (Vigilance) to Mumbai Municipal Commissioner Ajoy Mehta has recommended a Full Fledged Departmental Enquiry  (FFDE) against BMC’s five former senior engineers(bridges).

The four former officials against whom FFDE has been ordered in the preliminary probe report, which has been approved by the Municipal Commissioner— are then Chief Engineer (Bridges) S O Kori, then deputy chief engineer(Bridges), RB Tare, Executive Engineers(Bridges) A R Patil and A I Engineer and then Assistant Engineer(Bridges) S F Kakulte.

Alluding to the certification given in the report of the audit of the bridge that collapsed that said the “bridge is in a good condition and only minor repairs required to be carried out, the BMC’s Chief Engineer (Vigilance), the preliminary report stated: “There is prima facie reason to believe that the structural audit has been conducted in an irresponsible and negligent manner.... The structural report appears to have overlooked the critical elements of the bridge and their condition leading to the sad tragedy”.

“In spite of commissioning the structural audit of the bridge and spending public money on it, the true condition was not brought out. The tragedy could have been averted if the structural audit had been done diligently,” the preliminary report stated. 

In one of the several measures against the firm that had done an “irresponsible and negligent” audit leading to the collapse of the bridge and loss of human lives, the inquiry report said: “In view of the apparent neglect and irresponsible nature the audit report which has led to the collapse of the bridge and loss of human lives, an FIR be filed against the Structural Auditor Prof D D Desain‘s  Associated Engineering Consultants & Analysts Pvt Limited”

“All payments pending to be made to this structural auditor be stopped forthwith and for any payments made earlier, due process of recovery be started,” the inquiry report recommended.