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Six persons were killed in a collision between an SUV they were travelling in and a KSRTC bus near Kemmale gate in Sathanur on Monday.
The SUV was mangled and passers-by struggled to remove the jammed doors to pull the bodies out. The front portion of the bus was also damaged, and a few passengers along with the driver B.T. Nagaraj sustained injuries and were admitted to a hospital. They are said to be out of danger.
The incident occurred around 4.45 p.m. when the bus belonging to Kanakapura depot was heading to Halaguru.
The victims — said to be from in and around Kanakapura and working in Vidhana Soudha and Legislature House — had gone to visit a temple in MM Hills and were returning home.
In a statement, the KSRTC said the bus involved in the crash was KA 42 F 1745 attached to the Kanakapura depot in the Ramanagara division. “The KSRTC driver noticed the SUV rapidly approaching from the opposite direction and attempted to manoeuvre the bus towards the middle of the road to avoid the accident. Despite these efforts, the inevitable head-on collision between the two vehicles could not be avoided,” KSRTC added in the statement.
The police along with the help of the public cleared the vehicles off the road to clear the traffic. The bodies have been shifted to a hospital and the Sathanur police have registered a case against the KSRTC driver.