In a display of blatant disregard for the many dead and injured in the Kolkata flyover collapse, an official of the company constructing the very flyover dismissed the tragic incident as an act of god: perhaps one of the most absurd and irresponsible statement that could have been made. Things however were soon moving in the right direction with five officials of the firm being detained and a forensic team having collected samples from the accident site for investigation. Police on Friday have opened a case of culpable homicide against the company and results of the investigation is expected to be forthcoming shortly which will definitely set in motion a chain of events and hopefully the guilty will be exposed and punished accordingly. Consider this turn of events with that of the earthquake which shook the state with a 6.8 magnitude tremor. The most significant damage was that of the Ima Keithel structure completed just a few years before. Other than a few perfunctory inspections and a visit by a team of experts from IIT Roorkee to assess the damage, there was not the slightest effort on the part of the state government to ascertain the human factor which could have contributed to the state of the structure after the quake. Despite the hue and cry about the alleged shoddy workmanship and gross negligence on the part of the builder which incidentally was a firm from outside the state with considerable presence and control of large construction projects in Manipur, no step was taken up even to ascertain the exact cause for the extensive damage to the structure which could have solved a lot of unanswered questions and more importantly, helped in preventing such potentially life threatening conditions which could be averted. That the timing of the tremor kept the number of casualties and a possible violent public outburst to the minimum would be putting it mildly.
The continued malpractice of profiteering from public development works especially by those at the helm of affairs of the state needs to be curbed as such practices breeds corruption, inefficiency and nepotism which in turn impedes the pace of progress and development. Putting personal gain over social responsibility and abuse of power and rank to gain undeserved material benefits has become the order of the day. Such a social condition foments the creation of groups taking opportunity of the uncertainties and frustrations of the people to serve their own vested interests. Gradual erosion of faith of the general public on the government further poses a serious detriment to the activities of the state further aggravating the situation.
There have been more than enough controversies and apparent botch-ups in the state to keep it deviated from the real efforts towards progress. The state government should show commitment and concern for the welfare of its public rather than wasting resources and efforts in covering up its faults and misdeeds, for a forthright admission of its mistakes, if made inadvertently, will be understood and accepted by the public.
