A hype comes crashing down Premium

Tragic highway collapse in Kerala raises concerns about construction quality, safety, and accountability in major infrastructure projects.

As rain poured down on the afternoon of May 19, Shamsudheen Kollenchery’s car sped along the service road beneath the under-construction elevated National Highway-66 at Kooriyad near Tirurangadi. The family was in high spirits, heading for a wedding in the family. But their joy was short-lived.

A loud thud shook the vehicle and boulders came crashing down, sending his world into chaos. The car screeched to a halt, one wheel stuck in a wide crack that had seemingly opened up out of nowhere.

“I thought the earth was shaking,” Shamsudheen, who runs a grocery shop at Kodinhi, recalls, his voice still laced with the shock of that moment. “Out of the blue, my car was stuck in a just-developed crevice and was partly covered under debris.”

His wife, Rasiya, and their children sustained injuries as they scrambled to escape. The scene above them was one of utter devastation. The highway’s eight-metre embankment had given away under the weight of rainwater, buckling and collapsing over a 200-metre stretch. The elevated road crumbled, causing gaping fissures in the service road below. Deep and wide cracks splintered the surface as the embankment’s foundation sank. A massive section of the embankment heaved upwards and created a long ridge of displaced earth, giving a stark testament to engineering failure.

Miraculously, the occupants of three other cars that happened to be passing beneath escaped with minor injuries as they fled for their lives leaving their vehicles behind. “I’m still in shock. My family escaped with just bruises,” says Mohammed Ajmal from Chelari. His voice trembled as he showed his bruised hands. “If the entire embankment had come crashing down on us, our fate would have been sealed,” he says.

The collapse left the people of Malappuram reeling in shock and anger. The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) and the contracting company, KNRCL, too received a massive jolt as the 77-km stretch of NH-66 in Malappuram was just days away from its formal inauguration.

The NHAI refused to acknowledge engineering failure in the initial stages. “Rainwater percolated through the unfinished surface and the embankment burst as it could not bear the weight,” explained NHAI project director Anshul Sharma to the District Collector and the people’s representatives, who heckled him with questions about the cause of the accident.