Mizoram Bridge Collapse: Railways Constitutes High-Level Committee To Probe Incident That Killed 22

The four-member committee will have to submit its report within one month from the date of formation, the order said.

A four-member high-level committee has been set up by the Ministry of Railways to investigate the cause of the collapse of an under-construction bridge in Mizoram's Aizawl district, which led to the death of 22 workers, news agency PTI reported. The order stated that from the date of formation, the committee has to submit its report within one month.

The four members of the committee are BP Awasthi of the Railway Ministry’s Research Designs & Standards Organisation (RSDO), Dipti Ranjan Sahoo of IIT Delhi, Sharad Kumar Agarwal of Indian Railways Institute of Civil Engineering (IRICEN), and Sandeep Sharma, Chief Bridge Engineer, Northeast Frontier Railway zone (NF Railway), the order said.

The Works-I branch of the Railway Board has been designated as the nodal branch for the committee's operations. This encompasses the submission of a report for consideration by the railway board, implementation of the committee's recommendation and all related issues.

At least 26 people from West Bengal's Malda district were working on the bridge when it collapsed on Wednesday. The bodies of 22 persons have been recovered. Three were injured in the incident. One worker is still missing and search operations are on for him, PTI reported. The bridge over the Kurung River was in the Bairabi-Sairang new line project near Aizawl.

The accident was due to the collapse of a gantry, the Railways said, which was being launched on the bridge.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced a compensation of Rs 2 lakh from the Prime Minister's National Relief Fund (PMNRF) for the next of kin of each deceased and Rs 50,000 for the injured. Meanwhile, Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw announced a compensation of Rs 10 lakh for the kin of the workers. He also announced an ex gratia compensation of Rs 50,000 for those who suffered minor injuries.

On Friday morning, West Bengal Governor C V Ananda Bose left for Malda to meet the families of the workers killed. Bose boarded the Yuva Express after the Vande Bharat Express, in which he was scheduled to travel to Malda this morning, was cancelled due to some technical glitches. Earlier, West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee assured all forms of assistance to those killed in the accident and demanded that the Railways provide jobs to the next of kin of the deceased.