The National Human Rights Commission has issued notice to the Uttar Pradesh government over reported death of two workers at an site of an under-construction bridge in Saharanpur district.
The workers belonged to Maisroli village in Uttar Pradesh's Sambhal district.
The commission has observed that the content of the reports, if true, raise a serious issue of violation of human rights of the victims.
"The NHRC has taken suo motu cognisance of media reports that an iron net of an under-construction bridge of the Public Works Department (PWD) fell down leading to the death of two workers on the spot and injuries to another in City Kotwali area of Saharanpur," the rights panel said in a statement.
It has issued notices to the Uttar Pradesh chief secretary and the PWD secretary seeking a detailed report.
The chief secretary has also been asked to inform about the steps taken or proposed to deal with such incidents in the state, the NHRC said.
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"The police and administrative officers found the contractor responsible for negligence and had ordered an independent enquiry," the statement said.
The commission has also observed that the labourers working at a construction site are entitled to protective gears which the administration had, apparently, "failed to provide".
"It is also not clear as to whether there was compliance with standard operating procedures. In a welfare country like India, the state has a responsibility to remain vigilant to prevent such unfortunate incident by taking proper measures, which appears to have been lacking in this case," the NHRC statement said.
According to media reports on Wednesday, under the Smart City programme, a new bridge was under construction in place of a Khumran bridge and the work had been assigned to the PWD by the local civic authorities, it said.
The construction activities were in progress for the last two months. All the victims were the residents of village Maisroli of Sambhal district of the state.