A state government bus carrying Trinamool workers returning from the party’s July 21 mega rally in Calcutta to North Dinajpur met with an accident near the Durgapur Rajbari gate in the district’s Itahar early on Monday.
Around 40 passengers got injured. Some are reported to be critical.
The bus, carrying over 55 passengers, was en route to Karandighi in North Dinajpur when it crashed into the rear of a stationary dump truck on NH12 around 3.30am.
Preliminary investigations suggested that the driver might have dozed off, which led to the collision that left the front of the bus mangled under the impact.
All the injured, sources said, are from Alatapur in Karandighi block. At least 18 of them were admitted to the Raiganj Government Medical College and Hospital.
Sources said that Md Azad Rahman, the pradhan of Alatapur-I panchayat, and his deputy Mujrail Haque, are among those critically injured.
“Haque has been shifted from the Raiganj hospital to North Bengal Medical College and Hospital in Siliguri for advanced treatment,” said a source.
A police source said the dump truck was parked on the highway without any hazard light or indicator, compounding the risk for unsuspecting drivers.
Gautam Paul, the MLA of Karandighi, said 11 buses had left from the block for the July 21 event in Calcutta. “The accident occurred while one of the buses was returning,” he said.
Fatal collision
A person died and another got injured as two trucks collided head-on at Poro on NH31C under Alipurduar’s Kalchini police station limits on Tuesday morning.
Sources said one of the trucks, carrying cement from Bhutan, was headed for Assam. The other truck was coming from Assam.
At Poro, the vehicles collided head-on. Hafiz Ahmed, 45, the driver of the truck coming from Assam, died on the spot. His helper got injured. The driver and the helper of the cement-laden truck fled the spot, leaving behind the truck.
Traffic came to a halt on the highway for almost an hour till cops cleared the way.
The injured person, police sources said, was admitted to the Alipurduar district hospital. The police impounded both trucks and are in search of the absconding driver
and helper.
Bike skids
A biker, 19, and the pillion rider, 16, were injured after the motorcycle skidded off the road at Patuli in Calcutta on Monday afternoon. They were not wearing helmets,
police said.
The two were admitted to a hospital in Dhakuria.
In another accident, a six-year-old girl was hit by a bike at Sovabazar in the city on Sunday evening. She was treated and discharged from RG Kar hospital, police said.