Bombay HC pulls up BMC over sorry state of Lalbaug flyover

Mumbai: The Bombay high court on Monday directed the municipal commissioner of Mumbai and the chief engineer to file an affidavit if the contractor who built Lalbaug flyover would be held liable for shoddy work. The court also asked why they didn’t wait for a structural audit report before awarding the contract for resurfacing the flyover, as the report says the bridge had to be restored. The court asked the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) if it wanted to continue with the contract of surfacing the bridge or it wanted to cancel it in view of the audit report and if this contract would be cancelled, why the BMC didn’t wait for the report before awarding the contract.

The division bench headed by Justice Abhay Oka on Monday reprimanded the Mumbai Metropolitan Region Development Authority (MMRDA) and BMC after receiving a structural audit report that recommended restoration of the bridge. Though the copy of the report was not made available to the petitioner, the bench said it stated that the flyover needed to be restored.

Petitioner Bhagwanji Riayani had filed a PIL after the 2.45-km flyover built by Simplex Infrastructure between ITC Hotel in Parel and Jijamata Udyan in Byculla, which was built at a cost of Rs 140 crore and was thrown open to the public in June 2011, developed cracks last year and was closed at least thrice. Simplex has also been involved in four other accidents, one causing a death, in the past.

Mr Riayani’s counsel Sumedha Rao said that since 2010, when the flyover was still under construction, a cantilever of the under-construction bridge collapsed; a year later, days after the bridge was thrown open, potholes were observed on its surface and in April 2012, a concrete block fell down.