As many as 38 people, 27 of them schoolchildren, suffered minor injuries as a Tatra truck rammed head-on with an onmi bus carrying girl students of a Kozhikode-based school on Wednesday near Madukkarai.
The students were returning after a trip to Chennai. Moving towards Kerala, the bus was crossing the Bodipalayam junction on the L&T Bypass Road when the accident took place at around 7.30 am. The newly assembled Tatra truck, which was to be handed over to the Army, was heading to Bangalore from the BEML’s unit at Kanjikode. Police said a lorry going ahead of the Tatra truck suddenly slowed down, forcing the truck driver to swerve the vehicle to the right to avoid hitting it. “As the vehicle was left-hand driven, the driver had little chance of noticing the bus coming in the opposite direction. When taking the sudden turn, the truck driver lost control of the vehicle and it skidded to the right side of the road. The bus driver too was not able to avert the accident and the vehicles collided,” said Sub-inspector Venkatachalam of Madukkarai police station.
There were 42 girl students of MES Raja Residential School in the bus, 27 of whom suffered minor injuries. The boy students were travelling separately in two other buses. The students belonged to classes XI and XII.
Besides the students, five teachers, two other staff members, and the bus driver, Navjot, were injured. The Tatra truck driver, Sajith (27), and two persons accompanying him, were also injured. Four of them suffered fractures while the injuries of the others were minor. All the injured were treated in nearby private hospitals.
The Madukkarai police have booked Sajith for the accident and seized the Tatra truck for investigations.
