Introduction to Morbi Hanging Bridge
Morbi Hanging Bridge, an architectural gem nestled in the heart of Morbi, Gujarat, India, is a marvel that captivates the hearts of travellers and engineering enthusiasts alike. This 150-word blog post will provide you with a brief introduction to this enchanting attraction, known for its historical significance, unique architecture, and breathtaking scenery.
The Morbi Hanging Bridge, also referred to as ‘Jhulta Pul’ in the local language, has a rich history dating back to the pre-independence era. It served as a lifeline connecting two parts of the town, enabling trade and commerce. The bridge is a testament to the region’s heritage and stands as a symbol of resilience.
When Morbi Bridge Collapse
Hello Friends! On October 30, around 6.30 pm, a major clash takes place in Morvi district of Gujarat. A suspension bridge over the river collapses. More than 140 people are killed, of which 55 were children. Along with the collapse of this bridge, many People’s morals also fall down. Security footage of the bridge showed the structure shaking violently and people holding onto cables and fencing on either side of the bridge before the walkway gave way.[19] Images of rescue and recovery operations showed the walkway had divided at its midpoint, with some pieces still hanging from snapped cables.
RESPONSE OF SOME MEDIA
Some “Bikav” journalists put the blame on those who died in this massacre that it was their fault that this bridge collapsed. These people will not ask useful questions as to why the responsibility of maintaining the bridge was given to a company which generally only does this. Manufactured watches, electrical appliances and calculators
When this bridge did not get the Fitness Certificate from the Municipal Corporation, then why was it allowed to be opened? While repairing, why were the cables on the bridge which were rusted not replaced and when this company spent Rs. 2 crores to repair the bridge? If a budget of Rs was given, then why was only Rs 12 lakh spent?
Where did the rebel money go? This is not an isolated incident. Friends, we see such incidents from time to time in the country. Collapse of a bridge due to corruption is such a common event that it is repeatedly mentioned in films such as Akshay Kumar’s Khata Meetha film came out
WHERE DID BRIDGE COLLAPSE!
I thought that there was too much weight inside the bus, so the pool got broken. There is a Macchu river in Gujarat. This 230 meter long and 4 feet wide pool was built on top of it.
On one side it has Darbargad, Palace, Heritage, Hotel, on the other side an engineering college. It was commonly called Julto Pool, which literally means swinging bridge. You will find many such suspension bridges, friends, across the country and across the world. Famous Ram Jula and Laxman. Jula which is on the river Ganga in Uttarakhand
Or Dorba Chanti Bridge over Tehri Leg, which is India’s largest motorable suspension bridge. All such suspension bridges are not swinging bridges, some big famous examples which are not swinging bridges are Bandhra Worli Sea Link in Mumbai, Howrah Bridge of West Bengal and Delhi. Signature Bridge over in Yamuna River.
When and who made hanging bridge
Coming to the hanging bridge of Morbi, it was built during the time of Morbi’s former ruler Waghji Thakor. It was inaugurated by then-Mumbai Governor Richard Temple on 20 February 1879, i.e. it was 143 years old at that time. The cost of making it was Rs 3.5 lakh, which was a huge amount for that time.
2001 earthquake : bridge damage
But for its time, it used the latest technology and was a technological marvel. If we move ahead after several hundred years, in the year 2001, a terrible earthquake had hit Gujarat and the bridge was damaged due to it. Everyone knows the Bhuj earthquake. Regarding this, Bhuj is about 150 kilometers away and the bridge was seriously damaged due to Morvi.
Managed by government in 1960-2007
Now, right from the beginning, this hanging bridge was under the control of Morvi Municipality, ever since the municipality was formed as a body In 1960-61, there was a law according to this municipality that only 15 people would be allowed on this bridge at a time. But
2008: Contract Given To Oreva
At that time, tickets were charged from people whose price was only “1” rupee. Later, it was in the year 2008 itself for the first time that Oreva Group got involved with this pool. Between 2008 and 2018, this Oreva Group was taken the contract to manage this pool.
2018-2020 : Contract Was Expired And Renewed
When their contract expired in 2018, they did not renew it because they had disagreement with the municipality regarding the ticket rates. This company wanted to increase the ticket rates from Rs 10 to Rs 15 but the municipality did not agree with it. Discussions continued between them for 2 years and even during this 2 year interim period, Oreva Group was managing this bridge.
According to sources, the state government officials had to intervened in the matter, the municipality agreed to increase the ticket price to RS 15. hence, on June 3, 2020, Oreva Group presents a new contract to the municipality for 15 years. The contract in which it is allegedly written that full-fledged renovation of this bridge is a part of this contract. Records show that on August 27, 2020, the municipality accepted Oreva’s proposal, but this was the time of the pandemic, so this bridge was closed due to the pandemic. After one and a half years, the renovation and maintenance agreement was signed only in March 2022.
Agreement Between Gov. And Oreva
According to this agreement Ajanta Manufacturing Pvt. Ltd. which is the flagship company of Oreva Group is solely responsible for the maintenance of this hanging bridge for the next 15 years, for management, for operations, for security, for ticketing, for cleaning, basically for everything related to the bridge. This company is responsible for the thing to note here is that there is no mention in this agreement as to what is the upper limit as to how many people can come on the hanging bridge at a time. Another thing, Oreva is allowed to do commercial activity and branding in this contract and the municipality is involvement in only one thing and that thing was ticket price.
Talking about repairing, the company had to bear all the expenses to repair this bridge, it was given 8-10 months time, it can take this much time to repair this bridge, after which the bridge will be reopened. But apparently the repairing work was done very fast because this hanging bridge was opened after just 7 months.
The day of reopening was 26th October 2022 which coincides with the Gujarati New Year. On 24th October was Diwali, “Chhath Puja” was on 28th October, it was completely festive time and it was vacation time. The company was expecting that more people would come to visit the hanging bridge.
Interview Of Jaysukh Patel Before Reopening
So there will be more ticket sales at this time, but now on October 24, Jaisukh Patel, who was the chairman of Oreva group, gives an interview in front of the media when this bridge was being reopened and he says some very interesting things. He says in this interview that “ budget of repairing
this bridge is 2 cr. And 100% renovation can done by them. He said hanging bridge will sustain 8-10 years. ” In another side, Anchor like Sudhir chaudhari said “Why did people trust this company to repair this bridge?Why did people trust the government?”
With this logic, suppose you are going to visit a mall tomorrow and if there is a fire in the mall, then it is your fault. Why did you believe that the mall owner will follow the safety standards here?
According to Sudhir Bhai, if you go to eat in a restaurant and get food poisoning by eating bad food, then it is your fault. Why did you believe that this restaurant owner will serve you the right food? Gal, you are walking on the road. There is a pothole in your car and on the road due to which your car gets into an accident.
So it is your fault, why did you trust the government that the government will build proper roads? You have gone from home and your goods get stolen, then brother, why are you trusting the police that the police will come and save you? Why are you trusting the thieves? They will not steal your stuff. The Chief Officer of Morvi Municipality said that Oreva Group was given the charge of maintaining the hanging bridge for 15 years.
But he did not give any information to Morvi Municipality that they are going to reopen the bridge and Morvi Municipality did not even give him any fitness certificate.
Review Of Politicians on Collapse
Jairaj Singh Jadeja is a local BJP politician there. He blames Oreva that Why he sold tickets without restrictions. He said that it was the company’s fault that they sold so many tickets that there was overcrowding on the bridge due to which the bridge fell down. According to him, when the bridge was being managed by the local municipality, the total number of people on the bridge was Used to be restricted to not more than 20 at a time
Kusum Parmar, who is the President of BJP ruled municipality, has also blamed the company, saying that the total responsibility here was only of Oreva Group and there does not seem to be anything wrong in all these allegations because as I discussed, Oreva company told you in actually was in charge of all this.
Who Responsible For It
Later it was revealed that they were also charging a premium of two rupees and were selling tickets of ten rupees to twelve rupees from the visitors coming there, which was in violation of the agreement. Morbi police says that this The company quickly got the bridge opened so that it could cash in on the crowd coming on Diwali And talking about over-crowding, this also raises a big question. According to eyewitness estimates, 300-500 people were present on that bridge when the bridge collapsed. According to ticket sales, about 400 people had bought tickets to go to the bridge. F.I.R. According to 250-300 people were present on the bridge when it collapsed.
So how many people can be on the bridge at one time? Friends, this available capacity was never calculated. Indian Express news paper quoted Orewa spokesperson who said that the bridge collapsed because there were many people present on the midsection of the bridge and they were trying to move the bridge from side to side. seemed
The Indian Express news paper quoted an Oreva spokesperson who said that there were a lot of people on the midsection of the bridge and they were doing a lot of belly shaking.
Here it was the responsibility of the municipality to give a fitness certificate, but did the company do any quality check here to see whether the work was done properly or not? If you ever face such tragedies and emergency situations.
later we will be told that the entire renovation work was done by Oreva company which was subcontracted to another company, the name of that company was Dev Prakash Solutions. Which was run by a man named Prakash Bhai
In fact, in the press conference that Jaysukh Patel had done, he had also mentioned Prakash Bhai in his press conference and like Oreva company, Dev Prakash Solutions also had no expertise in handling such work. One page contract It was signed, between Oreva and this contractor company, Rs 29 lakh was given to them, to do the bridge repair work.
Missing Full Expansive In Sub-Contract
A very shocking question also arises here, Oreva had mentioned a budget of Rs 2 crore but in the budget of this sub contractor, only Rs 29 lakh was mentioned and when the police investigated, it was found that only Rs 12 lakh was mentioned. Only these have actually been spent, what happened to the rest of the money here?
An officer who was involved in the investigation told Times of India that very poor repair work has been done on this bridge at some places where rust had already formed, the sub contractor just applied rust free paint on it. At some places where aluminium footings were replaced, footings of poor quality were installed.
In the court, the DSP told in his testimony that the cable which was supposed to support the bridge was completely corroded, the cable itself was broken due to which the bridge later fell down and this damaged cable could not be replaced. Had the cable been replaced properly while repairing, this bridge would not have fallen down.
Prosecutor H.S. Panchal gave another observation in the court, he called the forensic specialist who came to the site saying that after the renovation, a 4 layered aluminium flooring was not installed on the flooring of the bridge due to which the weight of the bridge increased and this was also a There is a big reason due to which this bridge has fallen down.
Not Proper Maintenance Is Main Reason
You can imagine, this means that renovation and repairing work was done on the bridge but due to its weight the bridge became more vulnerable. If there was old flooring then the weight of the bridge would not have been so heavy. Now due to all these questions the police arrested 9 people. Arrested in this case are 2 ticket collectors who were selling tickets there.3 security guards who were present there on the bridge, 2 managers of Oreva company and 2 subcontractors Prakash Parmar and Devang Parmar, many sections of IPC have been imposed and our sales journalists have put all the responsibility on the shoulders of the company and what did the company do? Did?
No One Accept The Responsibility Of Collapse
The company has put the responsibility on the ticket clerks, security guards and its managers, but some other big questions arise here, about which you should think, first of all, are the ticket sellers being made scapegoats here? Just imagine when here neither the company nor the municipality had calculated any allowable capacity.
Nor was there any guideline here that only so many people can come on the bridge, so how do the people selling tickets know how many people can come on the bridge? Why is the poor man sitting there for 24 hours selling tickets, why is he being blamed? He had just come there in search of a job. The people above tell him to sell tickets and his job is to sell tickets.
Is Jaysukh Patel Is Responsible For It ?
No one ever told him not to sell more tickets than this. Second question, why was no FIR lodged against Jaysukh Patel, owner of Oreva company? It is understandable that a company is run by many people, many people are employed in different jobs, it is possible that not all of them are involved in contracting.
But who was saying so confidently in the press conference four days ago that the bridge is perfect? Who was making such big promises that we have done very good renovation work here? Didn’t he check any fitness test report before making this promise? Third, doesn’t the municipality have any responsibility here?
They put all the responsibility on the shoulders of the company saying that we did not give them any fitness certificate or no objection certificate but think about it, on October 24, Jaysukh Patel publicly announced in the press conference that the bridge is going to be opened if the municipality knows. Was that no fitness certificate has been given So were they sleeping? Why didn’t they stop the bridge from opening? People kept coming to this bridge for four days. Why didn’t they ban tourist entry? The fourth and most important question is what is the political nexus here?
Why Contract Given To Oreva
Why was the bridge contract given to such a company that manufactures home appliances, pots and lighting products and battery operated bikes? When BBC called the municipality chief, he did not answer. Later his assistant told BBC journalist Gita Pandey that oreva had first got this contract in 2008.
And the current chief had just renewed this contract, but why did he renew it? Was there any external pressure here? That we have to give contract to this company only? Had this company donated to any political party here
here the nexus between politics and corporate works in such a way that you give me a donation, I will give you money, donate in the political party’s account and the political party will offer you a contract. Did this thing happen here? Ever since electoral bonds came into existence, we cannot know these things.
In the quote, the prosecution had also raised the same point that all the contractors who were given this work were not qualified, first they were given it in 2007, then they were given it in 2022. Now to get rid of all these questions, Our Godhi media channels and Godhi influencers created a conspiracy theory about this tragedy.
POLITICAL GAME PLAY
A CCTV footage was released of this bridge before it collapsed. In this footage, it is seen that three boys are standing on their feet and behind them a boy wearing a white shirt is shaking the bridge in the last four seconds. Now what did the Twitter accounts of these IT Cell do?
Said that Aam Aadmi Party had a role in this conspiracy. There was some Aam Aadmi Party worker who was trying to shake this bridge here to break it. This conspiracy theory was shared by many people on Twitter and this thing was also shown repeatedly in some news channel debates. First these people juiced some old CCTV-TV video
To prove this of this bridge. When fact-checkers debunked them, saying that they were showing old footage. Then they released new footage and started chasing the people who were shaking the bridge. First of all, if you use a little logic you will realize how stupid this theory is. Someone will go to the bridge and try to shake it so that it collapses for some politics. It means that some person will risk his life without thinking that I am dead, but at least some politics could be done here. This made some sense. Second when fact checkers checked this video
It was read that these people were starting to show old videos. Third, when Dainik Bhaskar’s correspondence went to Morvi, they read that it is a very common thing for tourists to move the bridge in this manner and have fun. As I told you, there is a similar swinging bridge in Rishi Kesh also.
People shake it to their heart’s content just to have fun. When people used to call this bridge Julta Pool, it was a common thing for tourists here. You will find ten months old videos on YouTube where people are starting to move this bridge. Even three years old videos can be found where people are starting to move the bridge.
Such conspiracy theories are created just for politics. When a similar bridge collapse happened in Bengal in 2016, what did Prime Minister Modi say in his speech, Didi, this is not an act of God, this is an act of fraud, it is fraud.
At that time Mamta Bainarji had said in response that politics should not be played on such things. And still many opposition politicians say that such things should not be politicized. But my opinion here is the opposite.
Today friends, you will see that politics is played on such things. On Hindu Muslims, on Mughals, on Nehru, on things like Namkeen. When politics will not be played on work issues here, will politics be played on useless things? If a bridge breaks due to corruption and people lose their lives, is this not an important issue for politics?
Politics is politics, that is, the policy of getting rule. If politics only means mud slinging, rumours, conspiracy theories and useless gimmicks, then yes, politics should not be done on such things. But if the policy of ruling means understanding this,
Conclusion
Why were 140 people killed here? More than 50 children, who had their own dreams, these people who had their own families. It should be the duty of any proper politician here to raise his voice regarding this issue. These people should get justice here, and such incidents should not be repeated in future.
we believe that politics should be on issues like corruption, unemployment, education, inflation, farmers suicides, wealth inequality. Otherwise, you will ignore this issue by saying things like there should be no politics on this. So no one will talk about it, and more such tragedies will be seen in the times to come.
FAQs
- What is the Morbi Bridge, and when did it collapse?
- The Morbi Bridge, also known as [provide the bridge’s official or common name], is a prominent structure in Morbi, Gujarat, India. To learn about the specific incident of its collapse, please refer to the latest news reports for up-to-date information.
- What were the causes of the Morbi Bridge collapse?
- The causes of the Morbi Bridge collapse can vary and may include factors like structural weaknesses, natural disasters, maintenance issues, or other contributing elements. It is crucial to consult official reports for detailed information on the causes.
- Were there any casualties or injuries when the Morbi Bridge collapsed?
- Information regarding casualties or injuries resulting from the Morbi Bridge collapse can be found in official reports and news updates. These sources will provide accurate and up-to-date details on the incident.
- What actions have been taken to address the Morbi Bridge collapse?
- After a bridge collapse, authorities typically conduct investigations, initiate rescue and recovery efforts, and work on plans for reconstruction or repair. The specific actions taken will be documented in official reports and news coverage.
- Is the Morbi Bridge safe for public use now?
- The safety of the Morbi Bridge will depend on the measures taken by authorities following the collapse. It’s important to consult official sources and local authorities for information on the current status of the bridge.
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Important Notice
We have taken all this information from internal and external sources. We do not guarantee that all information is correct. There is a possibility that some information is wrong. We will not be responsible for any wrong information.