Action likely against 5 PWD engineers for mishap that killed 3 in Budaun

On Monday, three people, who were travelling from Gurugram to Farrukhabad via Budaun-Bareilly in a car, were killed after the car fell off the damaged bridge over the Ramganga river between Budaun and Bareilly

Two days after a collapsed bridge led to the deaths of three people in Budaun, authorities were mulling action against five public works department (PWD) engineers for negligence.

(For representation)

A senior government official said Bareilly division chief engineer Ajay Kumar had directed the Budaun superintending engineer (SE) to probe the matter and fix responsibility on officials who should have installed signages on the stretch and blocked the road for commuters. The official said the SE submitted a report on the matter on Tuesday.

The chief engineer, who acknowledged having received the report, said he recommended action against five officials—an executive engineer, two assistant engineers and two junior engineers—in his report to the department headquarters in Lucknow.

On Monday, three people, who were travelling from Gurugram to Farrukhabad via Budaun-Bareilly in a car, were killed after the car fell off the damaged bridge over the Ramganga river between Budaun and Bareilly. Reportedly, they were using GPS navigation, which showed a clear path on the stretch even though the bridge had caved in during flooding in the river in September 2023. Neither was any signage installed nor was the approach road shut down for commuters.

An official privy to the development said the enquiry report held responsible five people—Budaun executive engineer Naresh Kumar, assistant engineers Mohd Arif and Abhishek Kumar, and junior engineers Ajay Gangwar and Maharaj Singh—for the incident.

Also, the two assistant engineers and two junior engineers, along with other unidentified people, were named in an FIR lodged at the Dataganj police station of Budaun in connection with the incident. They were booked for culpable homicide under the Bhartiya Nyaya Sanhita section 105.

Two of the accident victims—Amit and Vivek Kumar—were brothers who were travelling with their friend Ajit Kumar to attend a wedding in Farrukhabad. All of them were under 35 years of age.