At least 132 people died in India when a colonial-era pedestrian bridge packed with revellers collapsed into the river below, police said Monday.
Authorities said nearly 500 people were celebrating the last day of the Diwali festival on and around the nearly 150-year-old suspension bridge in Morbi when supporting cables snapped after dark on Sunday.
The walkway and one fence crashed into the river, leaving the other side dangling in mid-air and hundreds of people in the water.
“It was traumatic when a woman showed me a photo of her daughter and asked if I had rescued her. I could not tell her that her daughter had died.”
“The cables snapped and the bridge came down in a split second. People fell on each other and into the river,” he told local media.
Most Indians cannot swim and another Morbi resident, Ranjanbhai Patel, said he helped pull out those who had been able to reach the banks.
Senior police official Ashok Kumar Yadav told AFP on Monday morning that the death toll stood at 132.
One local MP, Kalyanji Kundariya, told media he had lost 12 family members in the accident, including five children.
– ‘No certificate’ –
P. Dekavadiya, the head of police in Morbi, told AFP that more than 130 survivors had been rescued.
The Gujarat tourist department describes the “grand suspension bridge” some 200 kilometres (120 miles) west of the state’s main city, Ahmedabad, as an “artistic and technological marvel”.
District police have launched an enquiry against the contractor, Yadav said.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who was touring Gujarat, his home state, said that he “may rarely have experienced so much pain in my life.”
Accidents from old and poorly maintained infrastructure including bridges are common in India.
