SWABI: The concrete beams being placed for the Gohati Bridge on Swabi-Mardan road suddenly collapsed here on Wednesday.

Local people said the bridge was part of the much-awaited road widening project which had been under construction since 2019.

They said that two beams were already placed and the incident of bridge collapse occurred when the workers placed the third one on the site with the help of cranes. No worker was injured in the incident.

“As we were placing the third beam on the prepared set-up the bridge suddenly collapsed, leading to stoppage of the work,” said a worker while requesting anonymity.

Opposition blames incident on use of substandard material

Leaders of the opposition parties and local people have criticised the ruling party for what they called the use of substandard material in the construction of the road and bridges.

They said the cost of Swabi-Mardan road was Rs10 billion and it was being labelled as a great achievement of Pakistan Tehreek-i-Insaf leaders.

Mukhtiar Khan, former adviser to chief minister, said the bridge collapse had exposed the corrupt practices of the ruling party leaders.

Former MPA Babar Saleem said that each kilometre of this road cost about Rs240 million, but it seemed that corrupt practices had made the entire exercise futile.

Other opposition leaders said they would run a campaign against the use of substandard material in reconstruction and widening of the Swabi-Mardan road.

This correspondent tried to contact local PTI leaders for their comments, but they did not attend the call. However, one of the employees quoted the relevant contractor as saying that the placing of the last beam from a wrong angle caused the collapse of the bridge.

KILLED: A man allegedly killed his wife and minor daughter over a domestic issue in Hund village, said SHO Chota Lahor city police station Jawad Khan on Wednesday.

The SHO said that according to information Salman Khan and his wife exchanged hot words over some domestic issue. The man allegedly opened fire on his wife, who was also holding her one and a half years daughter in her arms. Both received bullet injuries and died on the spot.

The police registered an FIR and have started investigation.

Published in Dawn, January 27th, 2022