The horrific road accident near Namakkal in Tamil Nadu on Sunday midnight has forever changed the lives of several people in Raghavendra Colony near Chamarajpet here.
Eight persons — seven from the city of whom three were women — died and six of their family injured when their van rammed a stationary lorry at Parasivelur near Namakkal around 12.30 a.m.
Two couples and three elders died on the spot. Three girls — Navya (12), Amrutha (15) and Snehashree (11) — lost their parents while two men lost their wives. One father lost his children. The dead are Suma, Srinivas, Rohini, Shashibhushan, Manjula, Shankar Rao and Manjunath.
This 13-member group, all are from one family, had gone on a pilgrimage. After visiting Madurai, Kanyakumari and other places, they were on their way back to the city.
The bodies arrived in ambulances here on Monday night. Scores of distraught relatives and friends thronged their residences in Raghavendra Colony and Srinivas Nagar. “We lost seven persons from our family,” wept Manohar, who lost his daughters-in-law, sons-in-law and grandchildren. Thirteen persons left Bangalore on Friday in the Madura Express and hired a van in Tamil Nadu for the pilgrimage. As fate would have it, they decided to take the same van home. “They had booked train tickets but as they were not available for all family members, they cancelled them. The driver, who had been continuously driving since Friday, was also killed,” said Ashwini's friend Shalini.
