After waiting patiently for nearly six decades, the residents of Kyampur village in Uttar Pradesh finally decided they could wait no more. While the district administration believes the villagers moved “impatiently and should have given it more time”, the locals argue they had already endured a 58-year delay, Times of India reported.
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Situated along the Magai River in Ghazipur district, Kyampur and about 50 surrounding villages — home to over 70,000 people — have long struggled due to the lack of a bridge, according to the Times of India report.
Though the river is just 70 feet wide, the lack of a crossing forced locals to travel 40 km to cover what should have been a 10 km journey to the district headquarters.
Ray of hope
In January 2024, hope returned in the form of Captain (Retd.) Ravindra Yadav, a former civil engineer with the Indian Army’s 55 Engineer Regiment, who moved back to his ancestral home in Kyampur after retirement.
Shocked by the village’s continued isolation, he donated ₹10 lakh from his retirement fund and offered his technical expertise to build the bridge himself, the report said.
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“I served in the Army for three decades and assisted in building numerous bridges during my postings throughout the country, particularly in remote areas of Nagaland and Manipur. Post-retirement, I was disheartened to discover my ancestral village still lacking direct connectivity to the district headquarters. Hence, I decided to build a bridge, and fortunately received tremendous support from villagers and influential individuals, including architects and bridge engineers I met during my service,” Ravindra, who also served in the Border Roads Organisation (BRO) for three years, told Times Of India.
On February 25, 2024, the project received a symbolic boost when Justice Shekhar Kumar Yadav of the Allahabad High Court visited the village to lay the foundation stone and praised the people’s resilience and initiative.
Here’s what the administration said
However, the project faced a roadblock. The district administration asked villagers to pause construction until officials from PWD and the UP Bridge Corporation could assess the structure for quality and safety standards.
I was disheartened to discover my ancestral village still lacking direct connectivity to the district headquarters. Hence, I decided to build a bridge.
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District magistrate Aryka Akhauri told ToI, “The experts from PWD and UP Bridge Corporation have been assigned the task to check the structures built by villagers to see quality standards as well as load capacity that it will be able to bear.” As neither any technical committee nor any experts are involved, nor any prior permission was sought for it, people involved in constructing the bridge have been asked to halt the work till the structures are examined, she said, mentioning how checking its strength is a must for public safety.
“In view of their long-pending demand, we had requested the work plan from the departments concerned in October 2024. It was forwarded to the state government and might be taken up for approval soon,” the DM said. But, the Times of India reported, the villagers aren’t up for waiting any more. As the dusk descends on the village and cows come home every evening, they get ready with their shovels, spades and resolve to build their own bridge on the river Magai, the report said.
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