Bhubaneswar: The three-member team constituted to probe the Bomikhal flyover mishap here submitted its report to the state government, Thursday.
The panel, comprising chief engineer (Roads), chief engineer (Design) and chief engineer (Building), submitted its report to Works Minister Prafulla Mallik here at Secretariat. In its finding, the panel has held the contracting firm – Panda Infra Projects Ltd, solely responsible for the mishap at the under-construction bridge May 3, which claimed the life of one labourer and left another critically injured. On the other hand, the probe team gave a clean chit to the engineering staff engaged in the project.
Briefing the media about the findings of the panel, Mallik said, “Today we have received the probe report. As per the findings, the contracting firm is solely responsible for the mishap. The report also says that the contracting firm mostly engaged unskilled labourers, besides neglecting the security aspects at the work site.”
“Consequently, we have decided to hand over the construction work of the Bomikhal flyover and another flyover near Lingaraj temple to the Works Department and set a two-month deadline for their completion,” he said.
As of now, the pending work at Bomikhal flyover is estimated to be around `1-2 crore, while the remaining work at Pokharipur is worth around `50-60 lakh. Both these projects were awarded to Panda Infra Project Ltd.
The minister emphasised that the government will conduct a third-party probe to ascertain the quality of construction at these sites before opening the two flyovers for the public. “If any technical glitch is found, it would be rectified,” he pointed out.
Meanwhile, the government has decided to seek legal opinion on barring Panda Infra Project Ltd from two other bridge projects awarded to it in Sambalpur and Jatni. “We will take further action in this regard after obtaining the Law Department’s opinion,” Mallick said.
According to a Works Department official, the government plans to remove Panda Infra Projects from the Jatni and Sambalpur flyover works, as there are allegations of poor-quality work.
When asked why no action is being taken against the engineering staff for the mishap, Works secretary NK Pradhan said, “The mishap occurred due to the negligence of the contractor. Still, we will seek explanation from the field-level engineering staff in this regard.”
Meanwhile, Prashant Padhi, director (projects) of Panda Infra Projects, was arrested Thursday in connection with this mishap at Bomikhal. The city police arrested Padhi a week after the arrest of Pratap Kishore Panda, MD of Panda Infra Projects. Interestingly, the All Odisha Contractors’ Association has rejected the report of the probe committee. Association president Pravat Das said, “The contractor’s responsibility is to complete the project and hand it over to the government. But it is the engineers who supervise the quality of the work and ensure safety measures. In such cases, action should be taken against the engineers, but the minster and the officials have put the entire blame on the contractor. This is unfortunate.”
Questions are also being raised as to how the government will ensure zero mishap at the bridge projects by continuing the work with the same engineers, who allegedly failed to discharge their responsibilities.
Opposition Congress and BJP too have rejected the probe report and slammed the government for protecting the officials responsible for the mishap. State Congress president Niranjan Patnaik said the party will form an inquiry commission to find out the ‘actual’ culprits behind the recent mishaps at such under-construction sites. Similarly, BJP spokesperson Sajjan Sharma alleged that the government is always protecting the corrupt and inefficient officials and the probe report is just another example.
