City residents formed a human chain along the Brahmaputra riverfront in Machkhowa on Sunday with an appeal to save it from the new bridge coming up over the river.

The proposed 1.6km bridge will reduce travelling time from North Guwahati to the city. Sources said the PWD will be using technology which is superior to conventional bridge designs.

As part of the campaign, several hundred citizens, including around 200 children, assembled along the riverfront, carrying placards and banners with messages such as: “Don’t be greedy it’s time to greeny” and “We want natural environment, we want development”.

Starting at 9am, the human chain continued for two hours.

Later, a memorandum was submitted to PWD minister Himanta Biswa Sarma to address the issue.

“The work to construct the bridge has already started by the PWD. We appreciate development activities, but at the same time we want that our ecosystem and environment should not be disturbed. For development, destruction of environment should be minimum and also compensatory,” Mowsam Hazarika, a resident of Kumarpara, said.

Anurag Bhuyan, another city resident, said: “The government may appoint a technical committee with stakeholders from different fields. We are not against construction of the bridge.”