KOLKATA: A 45-year-old man and a 59-year-old woman became the latest victims of bus accidents on Friday, taking the total number of accident deaths to five in the past 72 hours .
Habibuddin Kaji (45), a resident of Jamalpur in Budge Budge, was crushed under the wheels of a private bus near the Police Training School (PTS) around 8am on Friday when he was trying to cross the road from the side of Race Course.
According to the police, the CCTV footage showed that Kaji was waiting to cross the road towards the PTS. “He ran and did not stop at the median divider. While he concentrated on the traffic coming from the Hastings side, he mistimed his run as traffic was coming from the SSKM end. He managed to outrun three vehicles but was mowed down by the bus plying on the Barasat-Botanical Garden route. We did not find any other bus behind the one involved in the accident. The speed was also within limit,” said an officer from Bhowanipore Traffic Guard.
Locals, however, claimed that the bus driver had suddenly picked up speed to overtake another bus plying on the same route.
Cops near PTS gate first made the victim sit on the pavement for a while before taking him to the hospital in an ambulance. “He carried no external injury. He was declared dead at the SSKM Hospital where doctors stated that the man succumbed to internal injuries,” said an officer from Hastings police, which registered the case. The fatal squad of traffic police is probing the case. This was the second fatal accident near the PTS this month, which led the police to mull new ways to control pedestrian movement at this point.
“We are planning to raise the height of the median divider and create a smaller pedestrian island so that people can wait before crossing the road,” said an officer at Lalbazar. In the second fatal accident that took place on SN Banerjee Road, Chabi Ghorai (59), a resident of Entally, fell down from a Picnic Garden-Howrah minibus while alighting and was run over by it.
In a separate accident, the driver of a truck was injured when a private bus hit it on the second Hooghly Bridge.
Meanwhile, a Barasat-bound private bus lost control and rammed into a tree near Benfish crossing in Sector V on Friday evening, causing minor injuries to six passengers and the driver. The left front portion of the bus was severely damaged under the impact of the accident. Neither the bus driver nor the passengers needed hospitalisation, said the police.
