Kolkata flyover collapse: Five IVRCL officials detained, police reach Hyderabad to quiz firm officials

Kolkata: Five officials of the company that was building a flyover that collapsed on to vehicles and street vendors here have been detained. Kolkata Police Commissioner Rajeev Kumar, who paid a visit to the mishap site, told reporters “We have detained a few officials of the construction company. We are taking action against them”. [caption id=“attachment_2706070” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] A file photo of the Vivekanand bridge collapse. PTI[/caption] According to another senior police official, who spoke to PTI on condition of anonymity, about seven persons, injured in yesterday’s mishap, were in a “very critical condition.” Asked when would the area be cleared off all the debris of concrete and iron girdles, the officer said, “The clearing at the main crossing (Ganesh Talkies crossings) will hopefully be over by today. But the rest like iron piers, iron pillars, broken concrete parts will be cleared in a step-by-step process.” The other end of the Vivekananda flyover towards the KK Tagore Street, where the metal pier, holding the bridge, was completely damaged would be cut but “a planned engineering plan is necessary for that,” he said. “It’s a very very congested area with buildings so close to the flyover. And most of the buildings are very old. So we must keep in mind that in order to remove the damaged portions of the flyover another mishap does not take place,” he said. Meanwhile, a four-member police team from West Bengal on Friday went to Hyderabad as part of its probe to question officials of Hyderabad-based IVRCL. “They have come and are doing investigation,” a top police official of Hyderabad Police told PTI. The Kolkata Police yesterday registered a case against the Hyderabad-based construction firm IVRCL under sections 304 (culpable homicide not amounting to murder), 308 (attempt to commit culpable homicide) and 407 of the IPC and sealed the local office of the company engaged in flyover’s construction. The toll in the flyover collapse rose to 24 on Friday. Police there estimated that the number of people injured in the mishap was close to 90. Reacting to the flyover collapse, an IVRCL official had on Thursday said, “It is nothing but God’s act,” even as another official denied any quality or technical issue as the cause behind the incident “as of now”. “It’s nothing but a God’s act. So far in 27 years we have constructed several number of bridges…it (today’s collapse) never happened,” K Panduranga Rao, Group Head (HR & Admin) of the Hyderabad-based company told reporters on Thursday.