A bus travelling with over 45 passengers crashed into the concrete railing of a bridge and plunged into a canal in Rajarhat on Friday morning.
The bus was travelling to Karunamoyee in Salt Lake from Berachapa in North 24-Parganas and fell into the Haroa canal in Rajarhat around 7.30am, eyewitnesses said.
As the bus lay on its side in the shallow canal, some of the passengers trapped inside tried to come out through its door, while others screamed for help, clinging to the windows.
Bystanders and some civic volunteers present jumped into the water and rescued the trapped passengers.
While most of them were discharged from a nearby hospital after treatment, nine of them were admitted to RG Kar Medical College and Hospital.
Doctors said some of those admitted to the hospital had injuries on their heads and in their shoulders. Some of the injured struggled to breathe because of injuries to the chest, a senior doctor said.
“More than the injuries, the patients are yet to get over their trauma,” the doctor said.
Nima Norbu Bhutia, the deputy commissioner of police (traffic) of Bidhannagar, told Metro: “The other passengers were taken to the Reckjoani primary health centre in Rajarhat, from where they were discharged after first-aid.”
The officer said the doctors at RG Kar had told the police that the passengers admitted there were “out of danger”.
A section of passengers alleged that the bus driver, which had started its journey from Berachapa at Deganga in North 24-Parganas, began speeding after reaching Kharibari in Rajarhat.
The bus crashed through the concrete railing at high speed, they said
The police rescued 46 passengers. The driver and the conductor, however, fled the scene before the police arrived.
The bus was pulled out of the canal with the help of a heavy crane.
A section of residents in Kharibari said that in the absence of adequate options for daily commute, office-goers rely solely on a few private buses that carry passengers to Salt Lake from the interiors of Rajarhat and other parts of North 24-Parganas.
The buses tend to speed after reaching the Kharibari area because the road remains mostly empty and there isn’t enough police patrol, they alleged.
“Stone chips, sand and other building materials are dumped on both sides of the road in the area, and that has made it even more risky driving through this stretch,” said Noor Hussain, a Kharibari resident. “Several two-wheelers have skidded off the thoroughfare in the past few days.”
“It could also be that the driver had dozed off while driving at high speed and rammed into the concrete railing,” said AKM Farhad, a local zilla parishad member.
The police said they would find out whether the bus was over speeding and if the driver had dozed off.