11 killed in road mishaps in AP

Vijayawada, Mar 15: Eleven people, including four medical students, were killed and at least 40 injured in two separate accidents in Andhra Pradesh, police said today.

Four MBBS students of Osmania Medical College in Hyderabad were killed in an accident on NH65 at Surayapalem on the outskirts of Vijayawada as the private Volvo bus they were travelling in rammed into a tree. As many as 31 other students were injured in the mishap last night.

Driver of the bus, who the injured students alleged was in an inebriated state, was also killed in the incident. The students were returning to Hyderabad in the specially-hired bus from Amalapuram in East Godavari district when the accidents took place around midnight.

In all, there were 48 medical students in the bus, who were returning after taking part in a sports meet in Amalapuram. The deceased students have been identified as M Pranay and Rajaram (fourth year) and Giri Laxman and M Vinay Teja (house surgeons).

"We suspected that the driver was drunk and we called the bus operator to change the driver. The operator assured us that the driver would be changed at Vijayawada but that did not happen.

The drunk driver was driving the vehicle at a high speed when it rammed into a roadside tree," some of the injured students, who were being treated in a private hospital in Vijayawada, said.

Telangana State Health Minister P Laxma Reddy rushed to Vijayawada to visit the injured students. He said the Telangana government would bear the medical expenses of the injured students.

"We will take necessary action against those responsible for the accident after an inquiry," the minister said at the hospital.

Chief Ministers of AP and Telangana, N Chandrababu Naidu and K Chandrasekhar Rao, expressed grief over the accident.

Naidu directed the officials to immediately submit a report on the causes for the accident. He also directed state Transport Minister Sidda Raghava Rao to study the reasons for the series of road accidents and take urgent steps for their prevention.

PTI