29 Jan 2023  |   07:01am IST

Bus veers off road, falls three metres down into roadside field, leaving 33 passengers injured

The driver of the bus lost control while negotiating a sharp turn on the narrow stretch leading to the culvert; Ponda police book him for rash and negligent driving

Team Herald

PONDA: Two women were grievously injured, while another 31 passengers - including students and senior citizens- were wounded, after the bus they were travelling in went off the road and fell into a field in Bhindem, Bethora. 

Police said that the driver of the bus that was ferrying passengers from Dabal to Ponda, lost control over the vehicle at a sharp turn on a narrow stretch, causing the vehicle to overturn into a three-metre deep field on the side of the road, around 7.30 am on Saturday.  

The police registered an offence against the driver of the bus Gautam Naik, 25, a resident of Dabal, Dharbandora, for rash and negligent driving.  

Due to the impact of the crash and the fall from a three-meter height, all the passengers sustained internal injuries and painful bruises as they fell on each other inside the vehicle. The trapped passengers were trying to get out of the fallen bus in a panicked state, when locals went to their rescue and helped pull them out. The passengers were taken to the Ponda Sub-District Hospital by ambulance.  

The accident victims included around 15 students of Ponda ITI and various colleges at Farmagudi. 

At the SDH, the passengers received treatment for neck injuries, bruised ribs and other chest injuries; some had fractured their limbs and all of them had painful cuts and scrapes. 

Most of the victims are locals of Bethora panchayat, said Chandrakant Samant, a panch member who was also part of the rescue operation. 

Cooperation Minister Subash Shirodkar visited Ponda SDH and met all the injured passengers from Dabal, Nirankar and Bethora and asked about their well-being. 

Shirodkar asserted the need for bus drivers to drive carefully. He said that he would direct the authorities concerned to inspect the narrow road and 

culvert into which the bus fell, and improvise it to prevent further accidents at the site. 

The locals recalled a horrific accident at the same spot a decade ago, when a bus hit a two-wheeler, throwing its rider, a Bethora local, into the culvert. The man died. Even as the locals have been demanding that the narrow stretch be widened, the widening work was taken up by the government but was soon halted by the owner of the field, said the locals.