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| One of the injured students. Picture by Sanjoy Chattopadhyaya |
A pool car carrying 13 students of Mahadevi Birla Girls’ Higher Secondary School collided with an army vehicle near Fort William on Thursday morning, leaving two of the children injured and the entire group traumatised.
The driver of the army jeep and an attendant in the pool car were injured, too.
Police said the white Sumo, not a registered pool car, was going down Red Road with students from the kindergarten to Class VII — most of them from Howrah — when it hit an army jeep at the Fort William crossing around 7.55am. The Sumo driver, 27-year-old Mohammad Akhtar, was allegedly speeding.
“The army jeep was taking a U-turn at the JK rotary to enter Fort William when the Sumo hit its left front door. The pool car was damaged and the jeep fell on its side, critically injuring army driver T. Raju,” said an officer at Maidan police station.
Raju, 30, was admitted to the Command Hospital with head and arm injuries. Akhtar, who wasn’t injured, was arrested.
“Our car was going at high speed. I was sitting in the front with the attendant. Suddenly, the car crashed into something and some of the girls sitting at the back were flung on top of us,” said Class IV student Pragati Mimani, who was injured in the head and neck.
Another student, Shalini Miheria of Class VI, required stitches on her lips.
The attendant, Sandhya Mandal, 40, had a head injury and a bruised jaw. She also suffered a dislocated shoulder. The other children escaped with a few bruises.
They were all taken to SSKM Hospital and sent home after first-aid. Principal Malini Bhagat said the school wasn’t responsible for the mishap as the pool car was a private one.
Pragati’s father, Sanjay Mimani, said: “We are forced to use a pool car as the school bus doesn’t come to Howrah.”
On why there was no school bus to and from Howrah, Bhagat said: “When we admit students, we inform parents that we can’t offer bus services to students living in Howrah as we don’t have a permit to ply our buses there.”
