Oreva official says bridge collapse 'will of God'

Surat: One of the accused in the Gujarat bridge collapse tragedy in which 135 people were killed told a court that it was "the will of God" that the incident took place.

The comment was made by Deepak Parekh, a manager of the Oreva company that was responsible for the maintenance of the 150-year-old bridge. He is one of the nine people arrested after the bridge crashed on Sunday.

"It was bhagwan ki ichcha (the will of God) that such an unfortunate event happened," he told Chief Judicial Magistrate MJ Khan.

Morbi Deputy Superintendent of Police PA Zala told the court that the cable of the bridge was "rusted" and had not been replaced by the company that renovated it.

The bridge was reopened to the public on October 26 without government approval or quality testing. "As part of maintenance and repair, only the platform was changed. The bridge was on a cable and no oiling or greasing of the cable was done. From where the cable broke, the cable was rusted. Had the cable been repaired, the incident would not have happened," the police officer said. A prosecutor told the judge that the contractors who carried out the bridge repairs were not qualified for the maintenance of public infrastructure.

Gujarat's Morbi Court on Wednesday has sent four people to police custody and the five to judicial custody till November 5.

Of the four persons in police custody, two are managers of the Oreva company, which threw the bridge open for visitors after seven months of maintenance works, and the other two are fabrication work contractor's people.

Speaking on the ongoing investigation, Rahul Tripathi, SP Morbi, said, "We are questioning all the 4 accused in our custody and we are trying to establish the liability of the different kinds of lapses in the bridge renovation. We are doing a thorough investigation and if anyone's role comes forward, he or she will be booked and arrested."