Bengaluru Metro accident: FIR against 6 bigwigs of pvt firm, 3 BMRCL engineers

BMRCL suspends engineers, cops ask it to reduce height of reinforcement cages

A day after the deadly metro accident, Bengaluru police launched criminal investigations against three BMRCL officials and six representatives of Nagarjuna Constructions Company (NCC) Ltd, the contractor for the 38.44-km KR Puram-Airport line.

Police also identified a few reinforcement cages of metro piers that are taller than necessary and asked Bangalore Metro Rail Corporation Ltd (BMRCL) to reduce their height.

For its part, the BMRCL has suspended the in-charge deputy chief engineer, executive engineer and site engineer pending an enquiry.

On Tuesday morning, an under-construction metro pier buckled and fell on a four-member family travelling on a motorcycle along the Outer Ring Road in HBR Layout. Tejaswini L Sulakhe, a woman techie, and her toddler son, Vihan L Sulakhe, died in the accident. Her husband Lohit Kumar V Sulakhe and toddler daughter Vismita L Sulakhe escaped with minor injuries.

Also Read — What caused the unfinished Namma Metro pier to fall?

Although Govindapura police registered an FIR over the incident on Tuesday, they didn't name any individual because Lohit hadn't taken any names in his complaint.

Bheemashankar S Guled, Deputy Commissioner of Police (East), said the immediate priority was to clear traffic and check the safety of other piers on the line.

Police later wrote to the BMRCL and sought a list of officials responsible for the work at the metro site. The BMRCL gave the names on Wednesday, Guled added.

Another police officer said nine individuals had been named in the FIR.

The first name on the list is the contractor (NCC Ltd). The company's joint director Prabhakar, director Chaitanya, senior project manager Mathai, project manager Vikash Singh and supervisor Lakshmipathi have also been named.

The suspects from BMRCL are deputy chief engineer Venkatesh Shetty, executive engineer Mahesh Bandekari and joint engineer Jaffer Sadiq.

Guled said all nine individuals had been summoned for questioning. "We will question them on the basis of inputs given by experts from the IISc, the Forensic Science Laboratory, the BMRCL and officials from the BBMP's road and flyover departments," he added.

Guled inspected the accident scene along with a BMRCL chief engineer and officials from the BBMP's road and flyover sections. The aim, he said, was to get officials' opinions about what might have caused the accident and whether human negligence had played a role.