Public prosecutors in the Morbi pedestrian bridge tragedy are aggressively establishing in the courts that the private firm tasked with the maintenance of the structure was the villain of the piece and not qualified for the job.
The focus has pushed the Oreva company in the dock but not before leaving questions on why a firm that makes quartz watches, e-bikes and CFL bulbs was given the contract without any tendering process and who gave it. The Morbi municipality is run by the BJP.
Gujarat Congress chief spokesperson Manish Doshi told The Telegraph: “The historical British-era bridge was not a private property but a State property and its officials must account for its safety even if they had outsourced its maintenance to a private firm.”
However, the FIR so far has not included any government agency or official. The police have till now confined the arrests to two managers of the company, fabrication work handlers, ticket vendors and some guards.
The national flag flies at half-mast at the Ahmedabad collector’s office as a state-wide mourning was observed in Gujarat on Wednesday to pay homage to the victims of the Morbi bridge collapse that killed 135 people. PTI picture
Morbi additional public prosecutor H.S. Panchal on Tuesday informed reporters that Deepak Parekh, a media manager of Oreva, had told a local court that the bridge collapse was “an act of God”.
As for not booking anyone from the Morbi municipality or the district collectorate, which awarded the contract, Morbi SP Rahul Tripathi said: “We are doing a thorough investigation and if anyone’s role comes up, he or she will be booked and arrested.”
He told reporters that the police were interrogating the arrested to establish responsibility at every stage of the work. PTI reported that the chief officer of the Morbi municipality on Wednesday appeared before the investigating officer and submitted some documents linked to the contract.
Parekh told the court that since the subcontractor Prakashbhai’s firm had done a good job in 2007, Oreva outsourced the work to him this time too.
The public prosecutor said although the company was not qualified to handle the job, it was given to Oreva first in 2007 and then in March 2022 without any tendering process and the contract was directly handed over to the firm.
He informed the court that the cables of the bridge were not changed although they were “rusting away”, and that elementary oiling and greasing were also not done on the old cables.
The government pleader quoted the investigating police officers to say that only the flooring work on the bridge was carried out, replacing the wooden planks with aluminium floor, which increased the weight of the structure.