Meet Madhavi Latha, the IISc rock engineering expert who helped build Chenab Bridge taller than Eiffel Tower

Madhavi Latha hails from Yedugundlapadu, a small village in Andhra Pradesh, and was the first engineer from her community.

On 20 February 2024, Prime Minister Narendra Modi flagged off the first Vande Bharat Express from Jammu to Srinagar, marking a transformative moment in India’s railway history. The inaugural run symbolised the near-completion of the Udhampur-Srinagar-Baramulla Rail Link (USBRL) project, a 272-kilometre engineering feat that links the Kashmir Valley to the rest of India with an all-weather railway corridor.

The Vande Bharat Express now connects Katra to Srinagar in under three hours, offering not only speed and convenience but also a strategic boost to defence logistics and year-round accessibility to the valley, which was earlier dependent on the often-blocked Jammu-Srinagar highway.

The most striking milestone along this route is the Chenab Bridge, an engineering marvel built at a staggering height of 359 metres above the riverbed — taller than the Eiffel Tower.

The Chenab Bridge, located in the Reasi district of Jammu and Kashmir, is now the world’s highest railway arch bridge. With an arch span of 467 metres and a total length of 1,315 metres, it has become a symbol of modern India’s infrastructural prowess. The bridge has been constructed to endure wind speeds of up to 260 km/h and has a projected lifespan of 120 years.

Built at a cost of Rs 1,486 crore, the bridge posed enormous engineering and geotechnical challenges owing to its location in the rugged Himalayas. Stability, seismic activity, and environmental durability were all key concerns that demanded innovative solutions.

Among the engineers who made this ambitious project possible is Professor G Madhavi Latha, a rock engineering specialist from the Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru. Her contribution, spanning nearly 17 years, involved slope stabilisation, foundation design, and implementation of geotechnical safety systems.

Latha hails from Yedugundlapadu, a small village in Andhra Pradesh, and was the first engineer from her community. After earning her BTech from JNTU Kakinada and an MTech from NIT Warangal, she pursued a PhD at IIT Madras and later joined IISc, Bengaluru, where she has been a faculty member since 2003.

Roped in by Northern Railways in collaboration with Afcons, Latha advised on complex issues like rock slope stability and foundation anchoring. Her expertise helped address the Himalayan terrain's unstable geological conditions.

Her research focuses on soil reinforcement mechanisms and she has pioneered image-based techniques to study micro-level shear behaviour in geosynthetics—technology that played a role in evaluating stability for the Chenab Bridge.

In a public acknowledgment, IISc stated: “We are extremely proud of Dr G Madhavi Latha for playing a crucial role in the construction of the Chenab Railway Bridge... Her work has been pivotal in making this engineering marvel a reality.”

In a viral post on X (formerly Twitter), the Indian Institute of Science wrote: “Meet Prof. G. Madhavi Latha, faculty at the Department of Civil Engineering, IISc. Her contribution in analysing slope stability, designing & constructing the foundations, and developing slope stabilisation systems helped make the Chenab Railway Bridge a reality.”

We are proud of Prof Madhavi Latha & her team's contribution to the #ChenabBridge inaugurated by Hon'bleThe team worked on stability of slopes, design & construction of foundations, design of slope stabilisation systems incl. rock anchors to withstand hazards. pic.twitter.com/BApCSJTRZX
IISc Bangalore (@iiscbangalore) June 6, 2025

With 255 km of the USBRL project already completed, the Chenab Bridge and the newly launched Vande Bharat train represent more than just engineering accomplishments. They signify national integration, defence preparedness, and economic growth in the Kashmir region.