BENGALURU: A group of friends travelling to Kukke Subramanya to celebrate the birthday of another friend would have been the perfect setting for a movie. But for two upcoming TV actors, it ended on a tragic note when the SUV they were travelling in crashed into a goods vehicle parked on National Highway 48 early on Thursday. Rachana (23) and Jeevan Suresh (25) died on the spot while five others suffered severe injuries. The group was travelling in a Tata Safari to Kukke Subramanya to celebrate the birthday of actor Karthik. The accident occurred near Solur of Nelamangala taluk, Ramanagara district around 2 am on Thursday.
Police said preliminary investigations suggested that overspeeding may have been the cause of the accident, adding that the vehicle was being driven at 140kmph when the accident took place. Police said Honnesh, who works in TV serials, was driving the car. Jeevan and Rachana were seated on the left side of the vehicle on the second and third row of seats respectively. Police suspect that Honnesh lost control of the vehicle as it was moving at a high speed. The left side of the vehicle crashed into the parked vehicle, killing Jeevan and Rachana on the spot. Passersby rushed all the seven members of the group to a hospital nearby where doctors declared Jeevan and Rachana dead on arrival. Police added that the postmortem reports suggested that they had not c o n s u m e d a n y alcohol.
The injured have been identified as B S Ranjith, Uttham, Honnesh, Karthik and Eric — all working in TV serials. Rachana’s father Gopal told Express that she was scheduled to leave for Hyderabad for the shooting of a TV serial but she had postponed it to celebrate Karthik’s birthday. Rachana has acted in serials like ‘Mahanadi’, ‘Madhu Bala’ and ‘Triveni Sangama’. Jeevan was a contestant in ‘Maja Bharatha’, a reality show for comedians. He has been a part of the industry for the past seven years. He is survived by his mother and an elder brother. Rajesh Mavalli, director of Mahanadi serial, said, “The last time I spoke to Rachana was eight months ago. She was very talented and hardworking.” Police say that NH-48 has turned into a death trap with several vehicles speeding at night. On August 19, near Eedigara mutt near Solur, a car carrying four people rammed a divider and flipped on to the other side of the road.