Two persons, including a schoolteacher, were killed and four others injured in a road accident near Gangaikondan in the small hours of Tuesday.
Police said a group of people from Melanotchikulam near Sattankulam in Tuticorin district were returning home in a car after participating in a condolence at Tirupur.
As the car broke down when they reached Gangaikondan, car driver Murugan (40) of Udaiyaandi asked the occupants of the car – Dhanaraj, a teacher, his wife Vasanthi (42) and relatives J. Bala Esakki (47), Boovendran (50) and his wife B. Shantha (47) – to push the car so that the vehicle, which was standing right on the four-lane national highway, could be moved to the roadside.
Even as Dhanaraj and Bala Esakki were pushing the vehicle, a speeding LPG cylinder-laden lorry from Madurai hit the car from behind, killing both Dhanaraj and Bala Esakki on the spot, and injuring Murugan, Vasanthi, Boovendran and Shantha.
Lorry driver Veerasamy of Karuppatti near Madurai surrendered before Thazhaiyoothu police. The police immediately rushed to the spot and sent the injured to Tirunelveli Medical College Hospital.
Gangaikondan police have registered a case and arrested Veerasamy.
