Women dies as car falls into ditch

Bhagalpur: A 29-year-old homemaker died in a mishap here on Tuesday night, because of dilapidated condition of the road, reminding the authorities that not just NH-80 but the entire road network in Bhagalpur has become a nightmare for residents.

Madhushudanpur police station house (SHO) officer Nashim Khan, Amrita Pritam died when the car in which she was returning to her Babu Tola locality home in Banka turned turtle into a roadside ditch full of rain water on the Kanjhi-Nathnagar block road near Hulash Chak. “She drowned and died inside the ditch while her husband, who was driving the car, and their two young children survived,” the SHO said on Wednesday.

Madhushudanpur police pulled the vehicle out on Wednesday. The woman’s body was handed over to her family members after autopsy at the Jawahar Lal Nehru Medical College and Hospital (JLNMCH) here.

The family took the Kanjhia-Nathnagar block road, a shortcut, to connect with the Bhagalpur-Amarpur-Banka road at Doubtbagh.

Amrita’s husband Chakra Sudarshan, who is also the RJD town president of Banka, said he and his family had reached his sister’s house in Vimkitta village at Nathnagar to attend a function in the family. “We were returning to Banka at night. Around 10.20pm we reached the small bridge on the road at Hulash Chak,” Chakra said. “The approach road to the bridge was knee deep in slush. As I drove on, the vehicle got trapped in mud and turned turtle into a roadside ditch full of rainwater. I had to break the window panes to exit from the drowned vehicle and then extricated our children. By then my wife had died inside the car and since it was late in the night I could not raise an alarm for help.”

Many residents blamed the condition of roads for Tuesday night’s accident. “The road was opened to traffic despite the poor condition of the approach road. Rain has washed out the flanks and the ditches are full of slush and rain water. Driving on this road is very dangerous, as it is not possible to assess the depth of the water in the ditches around,” said Vilash Yadav, a resident there.

Santosh Srivastava, a social worker at Nathnagar, alleged that most roads in Nathnagar are dilapidated.

Bindu Mandal, a resident of Shankarpur diara in Nathnagar block, spoke of a similar bridge without proper approach road at his village, which had become an accident-prone zone for the past three years. “The problem gets compounded during rains,” he said.

Bhagalpur district manager Pranav Kumar was not available for comment. “I have received several complaints from the public on the condition of roads, not just in the rural areas but also inside the city,” divisional commissioner Rajesh Kumar said during a press briefing on August 3 when he was asked about the sorry state of roads in Bhagalpur. “I told officials concerned to prepare a lists of such roads. Hoping repair work is initiated soon.”

Courtesy: The Telegraph