A 24-year old unemployed man of Patiala was killed and his 23-year-old friend, Sidakpreet Singh, sustained critical injuries when their speeding Swift car collided with a truck loaded with gravel around 4am on Thursday near Radha Soami Satsang centre on the airport road in SAS Nagar.
Sidakpreet, also from Patiala, was driving the car and was saved as the airbag of car opened in time after the collision. The deceased Harman Preet — the airbag on his side failed to function — had left Patiala for Chandigarh on Wednesday and were on their way back home. The truck was coming from Kharar and the driver Rakesh Singh fled the spot after the collision.
The police had a tough time taking out the bodies of the two accident victims from the mangled remains of the car.
Pit near accident spot a hazard
Over the past month, a large pit in the middle of the road near the traffic lights has emerged as a grave hazard for commuters. The police wrote to the Greater Mohali Area Development Authority (GMADA), the authority maintaining most roads in SAS Nagar, to repair the stretch, but got no response.
Mataur SHO Mahesh Saini said, “The truck driver Rakesh has been booked under Sections 279 (rash driving) and 304-A (causing death due to negligence) of the IPC after a complaint from Avtar Singh, a relative of the injured.”
In a previous accident at the site on May 5, the driver of a truck jumped red signal and mowed down a Sector-49 resident Nageshwar Prashad (47), a supervisor with Ranbaxy.
