Mumbai-Bengaluru highway accident: 5 killed as truck rams bus on highway in Pune

The accident was one of the three back-to-back mishaps that took place in a radius of one-and-a-half kilometres in Narhe Ambegaon in a span of two hours, with no serious casualties being reported from other two accidents. Both vehicles were at a very high speed on a downward gradient on the highway.

Officials from Bharti Vidya-peeth police station said the major accident took place around 2 am on Mumbai-Bengaluru Highway in front of Swaminarayan Temple in Narhe Ambegaon when the bus, which had started from Kolhapur on Saturday night and was taking passengers to Dombivli in Mumbai, was hit by a truck from behind. The driver of the truck, which was transporting gunny bags of sugar, has claimed that a brake failure of his vehicle led to the mishap.

“The truck hit the bus from behind after a suspected brake failure of the truck. After the impact, the truck turned on its side, badly mangling its entire body,” said Inspector Vijay Kumbhar, in-charge of Bharti Vidyapeeth police station.

Assistant Inspector Gangadhar Ghawate said, “As the truck hit the bus, the bus turned almost 180 degrees while moving ahead as its front portion rammed a rock face on the roadside. Thus, both front and back portions of the bus were heavily damaged. There were nearly 23 passengers in the bus and most of them were asleep when the accident took place.”

Of the 21 injured, 18 are bus passengers, three are from the cabin of the truck including its driver. Rescue teams from the fire brigades of the Pune Municipal Corporation (PMC) and Pune Metropolitan Regional Development Authority (PMRDA) were deployed after receiving information about the accident. Fire officer Gajanan Patrudkar said, “Our rescue teams initially took out 15-16 persons and sent them to hospitals in ambulances. Four-to-five persons who were grievously injured and were trapped inside the bus were rescued using hydraulic and pneumatic tools… There was lot of oil and fuel that spilled on the road along with sugar from the gunny bags in the truck… these were cleared from the road.”

Pune Zilla Parishad Chief Executive Officer Ayush Prasad said, “Ambulances of the Maharashtra Emergency Medical Services shifted the injured to the hospital.”

Traffic Control Branch Inspector Arjun Botre said, “A while after the accident, we had to stop the traffic on the Bengaluru to Mumbai corridor of the highway to take the damaged vehicles off the roads and also clear the spillage.” Officials said that the stoppage of the traffic on the Bengaluru to Mumbai corridor led to heavy jams. Traffic on the opposite corridor too slowed down for nearly two hours with the many drivers slowing down near the accident spot to see what had happened, officials said.

Deputy Commissioner of Police Smartana Patil said, “The driver of the truck has claimed that the brakes of his vehicle had failed, causing the accident. This claim will be examined. Vehicle inspectors from the Regional Transport Office (RTO) will examine the truck and submit a report and accordingly further course of investigation will be decided.”

The deceased have been identified as Ravindra Vasudev Korgaonkar (46), Ravindra’s mother Suvarna Vasudev Korgaonkar (85), Nisha Pramod Bhaskar (36), all three from Kolhapur, Arun Gopinath Sawant (54) from Kalyan East in Mumbai, Sanjay Sonu Gawali, a resident of Ambarnath in Thane (37).

The injured have been identified as Smita Jahagirdar (52), Nitina Jadhav (52), Madhukar Jadhav (62), Nikhil Jadhav (31), Pallavi Gawali (22), Sangeeta Jadhav (44), Rashmi Herlagi (37), Madhavi Sawant (48), Raju Kamble (40), Pooja Kamble (31), Ganesh Bagi (35), Sushant Pawar (28), Jayashri Desai (53), Sakshi Chandwani (35), Dheeraj Chand-wani (39), Sahebrao Waghmode (25), Athira Pramod Bhaskar (6), Haridas Mandhare (47), Onkar Vanarase (17) and Sunny Naik (35), who is the driver of the truck.

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A case of rash driving and causing death due to negligence was filed against the truck driver.