NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Tuesday decided to hear on November 14 a plea for a court-monitored judicial inquiry into the horrific Morbi Bridge Collapse tragedy, which claimed lives of more than 140 people on October 30.
Petitioner-advocate Vishal Tiwari mentioned the matter before a bench headed by Chief Justice U U Lalit.
"You are very quick," the bench observed as it listed the matter on November 14.
The PIL prayed for a direction for a probe headed by a retired SC judge in the tragedy.
Police had so far arrested nine people on Monday over the suspension bridge collapse on Machchhu river in Morbi town, Gujarat.
The plea said this is an utter dreadful act of violation of human rights that is the breach of right to life under Article 21 of the Constitution.
Tiwari asked the court to issue directions to all states to form committees to conduct risk assessment of all old and risky monuments, bridges etc.
Tiwari, in his plea, also sought a detailed safety audit of all old public structures across country, permanent disaster probe team in states to promptly attend to such tragedies.
"Such incident prima facie depicts the serious condition of responsibility, lapse, negligence, failure of administration, and unfaithful duty of care towards to the public by the government authorities.The maintenance and repairing work was delegated to a private operator, who had absolutely failed in the functioning of the bridge," Tiwari said, in his PIL.
The plea claimed since 1989 Bihar-Banmakhi Express train bogey accident tragedy, leading to 500 casualties, to Morbi bridge failure, it is clear that nothing in the administration has changed wherein such actions could have been avoided by showing reasonable duty of care and upfront repair and development activity.
"The Supreme Court should impose absolute liability on the Central and State Government to put public interest at large and work in accordance to public welfare. Many a times, there are reports of casualties, due to over crowding and lack of management by the administration and its municipal bodies thereby causing severe public casualties," it said.
The plea also said the incident shows the negligence and utter failure of government authorities.
It further added that in the past decade various incidents have taken place in the country due to the mismanagement, lapse in duty, and negligent maintenance activities.
The 141-year-old suspension bridge over the Machchhu River collapsed after it was reopened just last week following repairs and maintenance by a private operator.
The plea contended that at the time of collapse, the bridge had several hundred people on it which was over the permissible limit and no fitness certificate was taken by the private operator before reopening the bridge.
