Before Bihar’s Vikramshila bridge collapsed, a series of red flags – raised and ignored

Engineers and experts from the Border Road Organisation (BRO), the Indian Army and IIT Patna, as well as officers from the state Road Construction Department (RCD) and the Bihar Rajya Pul Nirman Nigam Limited (BRPNNL), have been at the site to plan the repair efforts, expected to take up to three months.

The BRPNN carries the onus of coordinating with the RCD to ensure the structural integrity of any bridge in the state. Both the BRPNN and the RCD had been made aware of the “precarious condition” of the bridge on multiple occasions over the past two months, sources said.

Following the collapse, RCD’s NH division executive engineer, Saket Kumar Roshan, was suspended for alleged dereliction of duty.

His suspension letter, issued on May 4, said, “The responsibility of maintenance of the bridge rested with RCD’s NH division (Bhagalpur) executive engineer Saket Kumar Roshan. Prima facie, he has been found guilty of being lax and disinterested about his duty and is being suspended with immediate effect.”

RCD sources told The Indian Express that between August 2024 and April 2026, there had been at least seven internal correspondences regarding the poor condition of the bridge, which was built in 2001. Over the years, the passage of overloaded trucks and the resultant weakening of the bearings at the joints have been the main reasons for its deteriorating condition, according to officials.

An RCD source said: “In August 2024, an inspection of the bridge by RCD superintending engineer showed gaps in six out of 60-odd expansion joints. In January 2025, RCD headquarters were reminded about the inspection. In March 2025, Bhagalpur District Magistrate Nawal Kishore Choudhary reminded visiting state government officials about widening cracks in the bridge. However, later that month, a joint team from IIT Patna and BRPNNL inspected the bridge and said the structure was safe.”

“In April 2025, the National Highways division, Bhagalpur, reported to RCD headquarters about four new cracks in the bridge. In April 2026, visiting RCD officials were told about the damage to the bearings in the bridge. That same month, a detailed report on the bridge’s poor condition was sent to RCD headquarters,” the source said. Less than a month later, the partial collapse occurred.

Before these red flags were raised, there had been two major repairs of the bridge between 2020 and 2024, with officials saying this suggested that it needed overall better maintenance. An RCD official said, “Between 2020 and 2022, several expansion joints had been repaired with partial closure of the bridge. In 2024, surface and structural reinforcement was done with new bituminous layers to cover the cracks appearing near the pillars. This was completed with limited success.”

An expert, who visited the bridge to inspect it after the partial collapse, said, “The repair budget that stood at Rs 26 crore before the collapse has now shot up to Rs 75 crore, with 13 new points of cracks being identified.”

BRPNNL chairman Chandrashekhar Singh said, “Our primary goal is to repair the bridge and restore traffic even as a parallel internal probe is on to assess the conditions that led to the partial collapse.”

“BRO experts and structural specialists from IIT are tasked with the delicate job of stabilising the ageing pillars and slabs. While these emergency repairs are underway, the ultimate solution to the region’s transport woes remains on the horizon. A parallel four-lane bridge is currently under construction and is scheduled to open by December 2026. This new infrastructure is expected to permanently offload traffic from the Vikramshila Setu, finally retiring the burdened bridge from heavy-duty service and preventing a repeat of the current gridlock,” SIngh said.

A senior RCD official said Chief Minister Samrat Choudhary has ordered a safety audit of all major bridges after this partial collapse. “The CM gave the instructions after he conducted an aerial survey of the bridge on May 5,” the official said.

Bihar has seen a number of bridge collapse incidents in recent years — at least 15 just between 2022 and 2024. The under-construction Aguwani-Sultanganj bridge over the Ganga, which began construction in 2014, has collapsed thrice — in 2022, 2023 and 2024. An investigation was ordered into the bridge construction, and during the probe, experts from IIT-Roorkee and NIT-Patna identified design flaws in the superstructure. The bridge was found to be unable to withstand wind and water pressure at certain places. A high-level probe committee, led by senior RCD officials, found two executive engineers and a deputy chief engineer guilty of negligence and suspended them. In April 2025, the state government approved the resumption of the bridge’s construction.

After 10 bridge collapse incidents in 2024 itself, the state government took a host of corrective measures, suspending over a dozen engineers for negligence and blacklisting about a half dozen contractors. The state implemented a new “Bridge Maintenance Policy” to ensure regular health audits of existing structures, and new SOPs had been established for quality management.