The Supreme Court on Wednesday transferred to Patna High Court a PIL seeking a structural audit of all public roads and bridges in Bihar in the backdrop of flyovers collapsing in the state over the years.

A bench of Chief Justice Sanjiv Khanna and Justice Sanjay Kumar, while noting that the issue could be better monitored by Patna High Court, asked the petitioner, advocate Brajesh Singh, and the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) to appear before the high court on May 14.

The bench said it was transferring the case for "expeditious" hearing but was not impressed with the counter-affidavit filed by the state that claimed that it had been regularly carrying out inspections of the bridges.

Terming the counter-affidavit "voluminous" without much details on issues raised by the petitioner, the bench orally noted that some of the officials who had been suspended for the collapse of various bridges had been brought back to the department concerned. The state's counsel informed the bench that disciplinary action had been initiated against the erring officials.

In September last year, the then bench of Chief Justice D.Y. Chandrachud had issued a notice on the petition filed by Brajesh Singh seeking a structural audit of all public roads and river bridges in Bihar in view of reports of frequent collapse, as the petitioner stated that as many as nine bridges had caved in in the last fortnight.

The petitioner cited the collapse of various bridges in Araria, Siwan, Madhubani, Kishanganj and other places in support of his contention.

Stating that such frequent mishaps had caused massive loss of lives, public money and hardships to the people, Singh urged the Supreme Court to issue direction to the Centre and the Bihar government to conduct, among other things, the highest structural audit of all existing and under-construction bridges, demolish or retrofit bridges which are under strain and evolve a permanent mechanism to oversee the operation of all bridges in the state.