The Hindu : New Delhi News : Blueline claims year’s 100th victim

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Sunday, Oct 28, 2007
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New Delhi

Blueline claims year’s 100th victim

Staff Reporter

PHOTO: SHIV KUMAR PUSHPAKAR

KILLERS AT LARGE: Scenes like this one here involving Blueline buses have come to be the Capital’s nightmare.

NEW DELHI: While the Delhi Government is still mulling over the course of action to rein in the Capital’s killer Blueline buses, the death toll in accidents involving these private buses so far this year has shot up to 100.

The latest casualty: a 10-year-old boy knocked down by another Blueline bus at Badarpur in South Delhi on Saturday.

As in most such cases so far this year, the bus driver vanished from the scene abandoning the vehicle on the road.

It all happened around 2-30 in the afternoon when young Tushar and his eight-year-old cousin Neha were on their way back home from Glory Public School on a motorcycle driven by his father’s employee, Ajay.

They were close to the Jaitpur T-point when a Blueline bus plying on route 460 between Badarpur and Minto Road hit the motorcycle. The victims fell on the road under the impact of the collision. Tushar sustained serious injuries and died on the spot. Ajay and Neha escaped with superficial injuries. The bus driver fled before the police arrived at the spot.

The boy’s body has been preserved at the All-India Institute of Medical Sciences for post-mortem. A Class IV student, Tushar lived in a joint family at Mohan Baba Nagar. His father, Madan, is engaged in transport business. His cousin Neha studies in Class III.

The Badarpur police have registered a case and summoned the bus owner to help in tracing the driver.

The tragic incident, ironically, took place on a day Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit stated that she had asked Delhi’s Police Commissioner to examine the proposal for a self-regulatory mechanism submitted by the Blueline Association to see if it would be feasible in containing accidents involving their buses. The Delhi Government would take further action on the basis of the findings, she said.

Nearly a dozen people have lost their lives in accidents involving Blueline buses in the Capital this month alone. The most tragic was the one a fortnight ago in which seven persons were killed and several injured when another Blueline bus plying on route 460 ploughed into a waiting crowd at a makeshift bus stop near Aali Gaon railway bridge in Badarpur.

The accident had triggered violent protests by local residents. There was a huge public outcry all round and a large number of citizens’ groups and political parties had demanded removal of the killer fleet from the Capital’s roads.

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