Hardinge Bridge

The Hardinge Bridge is a steel railway bridge over the river Ganges(+Padma) located at Paksey in East Bengal (now western Bangladesh). It is named after Lord Hardinge, who was the Viceroy of India from 1910 to 1916. The bridge is 1.8 kilometres (1.1 mi) long and was constructed to carry the broad gauge(BG) East Bengal Railway(EBR).

The construction of a railway bridge over the Ganges(+Padma) was proposed in 1889 by the Eastern Bengal Railway for easier communication between Calcutta and Eastern Bengal and Assam. In 1902, Sir F.J.E Spring prepared a report on the bridge. A technical committee reported that a bridge could be constructed at Sara crossing the lower Ganges between the Paksey and Bheramara Upazila stations on the BG railway from Khulna to Parbatipur Upazila. The construction of the bridge started in 1910 and finished two years later.

+ The river between the west side of Bangladesh and its confluence with the Jamuna was previously called the Ganges, and is now referred to as the Padma.

Records

An on-line search of the India Office Records (IOR) held at the British Library relating to this construction gives the following: -

• V/25/720/6 “Railway Board Technical Papers; 1903-1927" which contains ' No 215 The Hardinge Bridge over the Lower Ganges at Sara. Sir F J E Spring. 1921'
• L/AG/46/52 “Report of the Hardinge Bridge Committee; 1935" with the Catalogue comment 'The Hardinge Bridge over the Ganges between Damukdia (in Kushtia District) and Sara (in Pabna District) was completed in 1915 and linked the southern and northern sections of the Eastern Bengal State Railway. By 1934 changes in the course of the Ganges posed a threat to the structure of the bridge and a committee was appointed to suggest remedial measures.'