In the third accident at Manmad in Malegaon that took place in the wee hours of Monday, a man riding a motorcycle died while the pillion rider sustained injuries after the bike collided with a luxury bus. (Representational image)
In three accidents in different parts of Maharashtra over the past 24 hours, 18 persons lost their lives while 33 sustained injuries. The accidents took place in Pune, Manmad, and Yeole village in Nashik. This comes a day after nine persons from Dombivali were killed in a road accident in Gujarat.
According to the local police, the Yeole incident, in which eight people lost their lives, was caused by a speeding biker on the Manmad-Ahmednagar state highway around 6 pm on Sunday. Officers said it involved a Force trax cruiser, a Maruti Omni van, a State Transport (ST) bus and a bike. “The ST bus was behind the Maruti Omni van that had a family headed to Shirdi. A biker riding behind the ST bus tried overtaking the bus and the van. As he rode past the two vehicles, his bike came in the path of an oncoming Force trax cruiser in which people were returning to Dhule from Shirdi,” an officer said.
“As a result of the impact, the cruiser, which was going at a high speed, turned over and hit the Omni, which in turn collided with the ST bus behind it. It led to a major pile-up. Eight persons died, while 20 others sustained injuries,” he added.
The Yeole police has registered an FIR against the biker, who is recuperating at a hospital. “He too has sustained serious injuries and is at the hospital. Once he is discharged, he will be placed under arrest,” the officer said.
In the second accident, nine passengers were killed and 14 injured near the Pune-Nashik highway, when a bus crashed into a truck at 1:30 am Monday. According to police, owing to rain, the bus driver could not see the truck parked on the road because of a punctured tyre.
In the third accident at Manmad in Malegaon that took place in the wee hours of Monday, a man riding a motorcycle died while the pillion rider sustained injuries after the bike collided with a luxury bus.
Meanwhile, the last rites of the Gujarat accident victims were performed in Surat. On Sunday, nine members of a Dombivali family along with two of their Gujarat-based relatives had died after their vehicle rammed into a truck carrying LPG cylinders. Vipul Shah, a neighbour of Shashikant Shah, whose family was wiped out in the accident, said, “Rather than getting the bodies back here, the last rites were performed in Surat.” Jainam Shah, the sole survivor of the accident, is recuperating at a hospital in Ahmedabad.
Saharsa Soman, another neighbour, said, “We were very worried about how to break the news to Shah’s 80-year-old-aunt Ashumati, who lost her son in the accident, as she suffers from heart ailments. But eventually, we told her about the incident.”
