The Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) has criticized the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) for blaming the Nitish Kumar-led Bihar government for the collapse of a four-lane under-construction bridge on the Ganga river in the state’s Bhagalpur district.
The RJD spokesperson, Shakti Singh Yadav, stated that the bridge’s faulty construction took place during the tenure of Nand Kishore Yadav, Mangal Pandey, and Nitin Navin, who were the MLAs of BJP and ministers during the construction period from 2017 to 2022.
The bridge had collapsed last year on April 30, while Nitin Navin was the minister of the road construction department. Yadav questioned if corruption had taken place during BJP leaders’ tenure.
BJP’s IT cell in-charge Amit Malviya had tweeted a video of the bridge collapse and blamed Nitish Kumar for inaugurating it, stating that its completion time was 2020. BJP’s Vijay Kumar Sinha, leader of the opposition in Bihar assembly, alleged corruption on a large scale.
Samrat Chaudhary, BJP’s Bihar unit president, demanded Nitish Kumar’s resignation for his government’s involvement in corruption.
The criticism from RJD comes after BJP tried to shift the blame on the Bihar government for the bridge collapse. The incident had taken place last year, but BJP leaders are raising it as an issue during their campaign for the upcoming 2022 Bihar legislative assembly elections.
The bridge was being built across the Ganga river between Sultanganj area in Bhagalpur district and Khagaria district.
The collapse of infrastructure projects has been a common issue in Bihar, and political parties have often blamed each other for corruption and poor quality construction. As the election approaches, such incidents are likely to become a prominent issue in the campaigning process.
