CANACONA: Despite erecting signboards warning drivers of accident prone zones, accidents seem to happen with alarming regularity on the National Highway (NH) between Canacona and Margao. On Friday this stretch between Polem in Canacona till Margao was witness to three accidents.
In the first one at Karmalghat, the driver blacked out and lost control of the Nano car travelling from Panjim to Ankola, Karnataka. The car dashed and uprooted a sign board before falling in a ditch on the other side of the road. Speaking to Herald, he said he was lucky as no other vehicle was coming from the opposite side. Later a Renault car, met with an accident at Godeavoll near Balli, badly damaging the front portion of the car. All the passengers escaped with minor injuries.
Later at 11.00 PM a NP truck which had come from Sangli, Maharashtra and was on enroute to the industrial estate, Canacona to load waste from a defunct distillery to be taken to Solapur, Maharashtra for disposal. It veered off the road at Khaddem, near Balli, while trying to avoid an oncoming car which had strayed on the wrong side of the road. The truck after losing control went down a slope by the road side resulting in damage to the truck. All the occupants which included labourers escaped without out any injuries.
Since all this accidents involved a single vehicle and a Panchanama is not compulsory to claim insurance they were not reported at the police station.
The locals gathered at the accident site however were found complaining about the absence of crash barriers on some parts of the highway and also the difference in levels between the shoulder and the carpet of the road which is particularly dangerous for two wheelers.
At a recently held meeting of the highway officials with the local MLA Isidore Fernades, the MLA had instructed these short comings had to be sorted out to avoid disaster on the roads. However the number of accidents occurring indicates the PWD is not concerned about the safety of the road users said Elvis Fernandes a close confidant of the MLA. The digging of roads specially along the road on tarred motorable surface for laying out cables is particularly dangerous for two wheelers, the PWD NH should never allow such road digging on the motorable road surface.
