One killed, 3 critically injured in Odisha bridge collapse

One labourer was killed and three others critically injured when an under-construction bridge collapsed in Odisha’s Nabarangpur district on Sunday, police said.

Locals said that the under-construction bridge located at Talpadar in Umarkote block suddenly caved in when some workers were levelling the upper surface of the structure in the evening.

The labourers were buried under a heap of concrete and iron rods, they said.

The deceased was identified as Mahendra Mali. The three critically injured persons were admitted to the district hospital, a police officer said.

Negi river bridge

The bridge over Negi river was being built by a Bhubaneswar-based contractor under the Biju Setu Scheme of the Rural Development department.

The bridge was scheduled to have been built at a cost of ₹2.41 crore by March 2019 but the contractor missed the deadline, an official said.

Meanwhile, Development Commissioner P.K. Jena, who is also the in-charge of the Rural Development Department, directed the Nabarangpur collector to file criminal cases against the contractor and the officials inspecting the work.

He also asked the superintendent engineer based in Sunabeda and the engineer-in-chief to visit the site and take stock of the situation.