What’s broken is the bridge between the people and the system

The collapse of the iron bridge on Indrayani river in Pune district has left 4 dead and scores injured. Coming at a time when the country was struggling with multiple disasters, from the horrific Ahmedabad plane crash, to the helicopter crash in Kedarnath, it added to the grim situation and emotions. Individually all these incidents can be attributed to unavoidable accidents and closed, but when seen together they demand greater scrutiny. The Pune bridge collapse especially poses questions to the naked eye. The site seems to be a picturesque place, where the river especially in monsoons has a swift flow, and the backdrop suggests some kind of a low anicut too. Such spots near a large metropolitan city would definitely attract sight seeing and picnics. Even then there was only a narrow iron bridge allowing only one pedestrian at a time from each direction. The bridge wasn’t very old either and built only about 30 years ago it should have addressed these concerns. Further it was criminal negligence on part of local administration to simply put up a board of caution on the bridge while allowing people to assemble for picnics. This is without raising any serious concern about the quality of construction and design itself. Secondly our cities seriously seem to lack quality recreational facilities and spaces. While urban planning norms suggest about 15% of total city space should be used as recreational spaces including open spaces, green spaces and community spaces, none of our cities even aspire to meet these and our real estate hunger has destroyed our city scape. The worst part is the absolute silence of media, opposition and civil society. There is no effort to seek accountability from the system. However irrational it maybe, public grief and outrage deserves articulation and the administration must at least offer consolation and apologies if not answers and action. We need to reclaim our voice as a people, having a right to express emotions and not have to deal with an empty silence in return.