Road subsides a week after construction

Hardly a week after construction, parts of an important road at Aizuddin Mridhar Dangi in Faridpur Sadar upazila collapsed on June 30.

Local people, however, blamed use of substandard materials in the construction work that led to the collapses.

Construction of 800-metre portion of the two-kilometre road, stretching from Double Bridge area to Balu Dhoom via Afzal Mandal's Haat, started in March this year and completed in June 21.

During a recent visit to the area this correspondent saw parts of the newly constructed road have collapsed in at least eight separate places.

There is a large pond on one side of the road and vast farmland on its other side.

Villagers said construction of the road was completed on June 21, but within couple of days parts of the road suddenly collapsed at several places on June 30.

The incident occurred due to use of low-quality construction materials and lack of proper monitoring by the authorities concerned, they alleged.

According to Faridpur Local Government Engineering Department (LGED), construction of the two-kilometre-long road, at a cost of over Tk 2.17 crore, was scheduled to be started in 2020.

Imtiaz Hasan Rubel of Faridpur municipality got the work order.

But the construction work could not be started after contractor Rubel and his brother Sajjad Hossain Barkat were arrested in a case on June 7, the same year.

Meanwhile, a fresh tender was called at the beginning of this year and Faridpur Jannat Construction Ltd got the work order.

Later, Mujibur Rahman, a resident of Decrerchar area in the upazila, implemented the construction work as a sub-contractor.

Ishak Matubbar, a resident of Aizuddin Mridhar Dangi village, said parts of the newly constructed road collapsed due to use of substandard materials.

Char Madhabdia Union Parishad (UP) Chairman Tuhin Mandal said he urged the contractor concerned on several occasions to conduct the work properly, but he did not pay heed to his words.

As a result, the newly-constructed road started to collapse within couple of days of its construction, the UP chairman added.

Contacted, Sub-contractor Mujibur Rahman said there were no irregularities in the construction work.

He also denied the allegation of using low-quality materials in the construction work and said the collapses occurred due to continuous rainfall in the last couple of days.

The collapsed parts will be repaired soon, he added.

Faridpur LGED Assistant Engineer Monir Hossain, also supervisor of the work, said heavy rainfall has triggered the collapses at different spots of the newly-constructed road.  Besides, the soil underneath the road is sandy that led to the collapses, the engineer said, adding that the contractor concerned will not get the rest amount of the bill unless he repairs the collapsed parts of the road.