By Arun Pratap Singh
Dehradun, 22 Jun: SDM Ashish Chandra Ghildiyal has completed his magisterial inquiry into the incident of tempo-traveller accident on the Rishikesh-Badrinath highway on 15 June in which 15 pilgrims had died. The inquiry report has been submitted to District Magistrate Rudraprayag. As was being speculated, the report says that the cause behind the accident has been found to be the driver dozing off while driving the vehicle. Apart from this, nothing substantial has been revealed in the technical investigation of the vehicle.
The inquiring magistrate has recorded the statements of the injured as well as eyewitnesses and the officials who played an important role in the rescue in his report. The three-member investigation team has conducted its investigation on the basis of all aspects regarding the permit of the accidented vehicle, vehicle insurance, online booking as well as the driver’s experience of driving the vehicle in the mountains and other important subjects.
The investigation team conducted inspection of the accident spot and the river bed where the accident hit vehicle is lying. In addition, statements of the people injured in the accident, who were admitted to the district hospital, have also been recorded prominently. The injured also said that the cause of the accident was the driver falling asleep while driving. It may be recalled that on the night of 14th June, 26 people including the driver left for Chopta-Tungnath-Chandrashila from New Delhi in a 20 seater Tempo-Traveller.
On 15th June at 11.30 am, this vehicle went out of control near Rantoli on the Badrinath Highway and fell straight into the Alaknanda river. In this accident, 10 people died on the spot. At the same time, five of the injured admitted to the District Hospital and AIIMS Rishikesh died during treatment, thus taking the total number of deaths to 15. Here, the investigating officer, SDM Ashish Chandra Ghildiyal said that the report of the magisterial inquiry has been sent to the District Magistrate.
He said that information has also been obtained from the agency office in Gurgaon regarding the purchase of the vehicle, total bookings till now, the states in which it was operated and the total distance. It was told that it was also clear from the vehicle permit that the vehicle had 20 seats and a total of 26 people including the driver were travelling in it.
However the bigger question is whether the authorities regulating the Char Dham Yatra as well as the Travel agencies will learn any lessons from this. Accidents on hill roads are becoming very frequent and this year alone, several accidents have been reported.
