445 bridges in Mumbai to undergo safety audit: Rail minister

Mumbai: The railways today said it will carry out a safety audit of nearly 450 road overbridges, foot overbridges and bridges over the pipelines here to detect and rectify any flaws in them.

Railway Minister Piyush Goyal made the announcement in suburban Andheri where a portion of a road overbridge (ROB) collapsed this morning due to heavy rains.

The road overbridge, built in 1971, collapsed near the eastern side of the Andheri railway station and some parts of it fell on rail tracks, disrupting train services.

Five people were injured in the incident and Goyal announced a compensation of Rs 1 lakh for each of them.

A joint safety audit will be conducted by the Railways, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) and IIT-Bombay of the 445 ROBs, foot overbridges (FOBs) and bridges over the pipelines in Mumbai as part of efforts to improve safety of commuters, Goyal said.

“I have spoken to the director of IIT-Bombay and he has assured all cooperation. In the next six months, all the 445 ROBs, FOBs and other bridges going above water pipelines will be inspected and a joint safety audit will be carried out in association with the BMC as well,” he told reporters at the site of the incident.

The railway minister said that based on its findings, rectification of any flaws in these bridges will be taken up by his ministry on mission mode.

Terming today’s incident extremely unfortunate, Goyal said that he has already announced an inquiry into it by the Commissioner of Railway Safety (CRS) and has sought a report within 15 days.

Informing the reporters that hundreds of officers and employees of the Railways were involved in the restoration work on a war footing, he said, “Two lines of the Harbour corridor have become operational and we hope by 8 pm the other three lines will also become operational.