“Act of God”: Oreva manager on Morbi Bridge collapse

Dilip, a former president of the Morbi Bar Association, said one of the attorneys defending an accused in the Gujarat bridge collapse catastrophe, in which 135 people died, had argued in court that it was an “act of God” (Bhagwan ki ichcha) and that, as a result, the arrest of the accused was improper.

“The accused inside the court framed the mishap as an ‘act of god’, but as per the FIR registered in the case, it is a case of ‘criminal negligence, and not an ‘act of god’,” news agency ANI quoted Dilip.

Deepak Parekh, a manager with the Oreva corporation, reportedly made the remark about the 150-year-old suspension bridge in Morbi. One of the nine people detained following the bridge collapse on Sunday is Parekh.

On Wednesday, attorneys in Morbi staged a protest march to express their reluctance to defend all nine of the accused.

Deepak Parekh, a manager for the Oreva corporation, reportedly made the remark about the 150-year-old suspension bridge in Morbi. One of the nine people detained following the bridge collapse on Sunday is Parekh.

On Wednesday, attorneys in Morbi staged a protest march to express their reluctance to defend all nine of the defendants.

“The Morbi Bar Association and Rajkot Bar Association have decided to not take the case of nine people arrested in the Morbi tragedy and represent them. Both the Bar Associations have passed this Resolution,” AC Prajapati, senior advocate, Morbi Bar Association said.

On October 30, the bridge in the Morbi district that crossed the Machchhu River collapsed.

The nine members of the Oreva group who are accused of the tragic bridge collapse have been named in an FIR filed by the Gujarat Police under IPC sections 304 and 308 (culpable homicide not amounting to murder).

A five-person committee has been created by the Gujarat government to investigate the bridge collapse tragedy.