Joy ride on new bike ends in tragedy

Chennai: A joy ride on his new bike to take a Facebook profile picture in the backdrop of the Marina beach turned fatal for a 17-year-old, class 12 pass out student on Saturday morning.

He lost control of the speeding vehicle and rammed into the pillar of University of Madras gate on Wallajah road and died on the spot. The boy, identified at S. Karthick, was a resident of United Colony in Kolathur, was accompanied by his friend S. Ulaganathan, also from the same locality, who suffered grievous injuries and is being treated at a private hospital in the city.

Karthick, who is to turn 18 in four days, had got the bike as a pre-birthday gift, which the family had allegedly bought by pledging jewels to appease the boy who had enrolled for an engineering course at Dr MGR University at Maduravoyal, according to a police official.

On Saturday, around 7 am, Karthick’s was speeding on Wallajah road, but while negotiating a small bend near the VIP gate of Madras University, he hit slush on the road and lost control of the vehicle.

The bike’s front dome smashed into the pillar and Karthick, who was not wearing a helmet, suffered a head injury, a police officer said. Anna Square traffic investigation wing rushed to the spot and secured the duo and moved them to government Royapettah hospital. Ulaganathan was later moved to a private hospital and is said to be in a serious condition.

“He had got the bike, worth over Rs 1 lakh, only on July 19 and had informed his family that he was going to the beach to take pictures with the sun as backdrop along with his bike,” a relative of the victim told Deccan Chronicle. The bike was bought in the name of his father Sivakumar, a supervisor with a private courier firm in the city, and is yet to be registered.