An under-construction bridge over the Ganga river collapsed in Bihar on Sunday, portions of which were deliberately destroyed in a planned fashion under expert advice as it had design flaws, claimed State Government officials. The bridge was supposed to connect Khagaria district with Bhagalpur. Images of the mishap that took place in Khagaria evoked immediate criticisms from the Opposition, prompting Deputy Chief Minister Tejashwi Yadav and Additional Chief Secretary of Road Construction Department, Pratyay Amrit, to hold a hurried press conference. “It may be recalled that a portion of this bridge had collapsed on April 30 last year. We had, thereafter, approached IIT-Roorkee, which is esteemed for its expertise in construction matters, to conduct a study. 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," Yadav said at the press conference.
Amrit, who took over, added, “It was decided that we must not take any chance and wait for a final report. So we went ahead with pulling down parts of the bridge. Today's incident was a part of such a preventive exercise”