Crucial bridge near China border collapses, two rescued by locals
A crucial bridge leading to the China border in Pithoragarh district of Uttarakhand, which was the only supply line for the Army and the IndoTibetan Border Police (ITBP), came crashing down when a truck carrying a proclainer (earth excavation machine) was crossing it, on Monday.
The proclainer was to be used in the ongoing road construction work up to the China border in the mountainous Johar valley. The bridge is barely 65 km from the border. The area is now cut off from the state.
Eyewitnesses told Deccan Chronicle over the telephone that at around 9.10 am the truck was half-way on the rickety bridge near Munsiyari village on the Dhapa-Milam road when it collapsed. The truck with the proclainer fell into the deep gorge. Locals managed to rescue two people from the crash who had received serious injuries and were taken to a nearby hospital. “The bridge is about 25 years old and was constructed by the GREF (General Reserve Engineer Force) of the
Border Roads Organisation (BRO). Unless it is reconstructed quickly, nearly 7,000 villagers, personnel of the Indian Army and ITBP will be cut off as this is the only way to the China border,” Laxman Pangtey of Munsiyari told this newspaper.
Another eyewitness,
Vicky Rawat, said that there had been apprehensions that the bridge might collapse any time. “Even the driver was sceptical whether the bridge would withstand the weight but tried to cross it anyway,” Rawat said. It is learnt that the proclainer belongs to ABCI Infrastructure Ltd, which is engaged in constructing the road.
The BRO had stepped up construction of the road up to the last post on the India-China border in Johar valley even as the stand-off on the Line of Actual Control (LAC) was on. Recently, helicopters landed heavy road building machinery in Johar valley for construction of the strategic Munsiyari-BugdiyarMilam road. The BRO has a major challenge ahead as it tries to cut through hard rock on the nearly 20 km of the road leading to the border.