9 dead, many injured as truck collides with cruiser in Karnataka’s Tumakuru

The truck which collided with a cruiser was ferrying daily wage labourers leaving nine persons dead with many others injured

9 dead, many injured as truck collides with cruiser in Karnataka’s Tumakuru

In a tragic incident, at least nine people were killed after their truck collided with the cruiser in which they were travelling in on Thursday.

The incident took place near Tumakuru, about 70kms from Bengaluru.

“Nine people have died near Balenahalli in Shira of Tumakuru. Several others got injured. This is a very unfortunate incident,” Araga Jnanendra, Karnataka’s minister for home affairs said on Thursday.

The minister said he has instructed the district authorities and police to ensure adequate treatment of the survivors.

The truck which collided with a cruiser was ferrying daily wage labourers.

There has been a rise in the accidents reported from Karnataka’s highways for the past few months.

Earlier in August, six members of a family including two women and a six-month old infant died in a road accident near Arakera (K) village of Gurmitkal taluk in the north eastern part of Karnataka.

On May 24, eight people were killed and 28 others injured in a collision between a private passenger bus and a truck on Pune-Bengaluru national highway in Hubballi.

Police, who registered a complaint in the case, said the driver’s negligence and overspeeding resulted in the accident.

However, the police report didn’t mention the fact that the location where the accident took place has a six-lane highway which shrinks to a two-lane road without a median.

Authorities have blamed over speeding and rash driving as the causes of accidents, however, the larger issue of road safety hasn’t been addressed yet, HT reported in June.

Local residents pointed out that the bad design of highways coupled with lack of transport facilities in the accident sites, are a few of the problems that reportedly caused them.