SASARAM: A vast stretch of the recently laid National Highway (NH)-2C bulged, cracked and created an explosion-like sound at Chitauli village under the Tilothu police station area, about 40km from here, on Friday.
Locals said a shrilling sound, like the one that accompanies a high-intensity explosion, was heard in a radius of 6km from the spot where the road stretch developed a massive crack. "We initially mistook it for a Maoist operation as the region is a stronghold of Left extremists," said a villager.
On getting information, senior NH officials visited the site and did preliminary investigation. They said there were no casualties since there was no traffic movement on the stretch at the time of the incident.
Locals recalled they had witnessed a somewhat similar sight of road bulging, albeit not accompanied with any sound, on the stretch, about 400 metres north from the site of Friday's incident. The 80km NH-2C emanates from NH-2 at Dehri-on-Sone and goes up to the Uttar Pradesh border via Maoist-hit areas in Bihar. It was constructed two years ago.
Rana Prasad, executive engineer of the NH wing of state road construction department at Gaya, described Friday's incident as "a peculiar case". He said a high-level committee of experts has been formed to ascertain the cause of the incident.
