Chennai: Two women riding triples die under bus wheel

Chennai: In a gruesome road mishap on Anna Salai in central Chennai Tuesday morning, two women on pillion of a male bike rider were crushed to death when a MTC bus went over them. The 20-year-old rider Nissan Kola Shiva was grievously injured and is in a critical condition in the ICU of Rajiv Gandhi GH, police said.

They have identified the women as Nagalakshmi and Bhavani. It appears that all the three hailed from Andhra Pradesh and were working as engineers in a private firm at Egmore. They lived at Velachery and could be proceeding to the workplace. While Shiva wore a helmet, the pillion-riders were not. The bike carried AP registration, police said.

They said Shiva and Nagalakshmi hailed from Seethanagaram in East Godavari while Bhavani was from West Godavari. More details were awaited.

A police video, obviously from a nearby CCTV, has gone viral and shows the terrible accident in all its gory details. The tragedy happened at about 8.50 am on the Anna Salai close to a mosque opposite YMCA grounds. The video shows Shiva speeding through the narrow space between a MTC bus on his right and another bike on his left. The rider on the left appeared to have turned slightly to his right to avoid hitting an auto that suddenly entered the road from a side and that results in his bike handle-bar hitting Shiva's and both the riders lose control.

While Shiva with his two woman pillion-riders falls right in front of the bus and goes under its wheels, the other bike rider recovered quickly from the impact and managed to get up from the near-fall.

While Nagalakshmi and Bhavani died on the spot, Shiva was badly injured and was rushed in an unconscious condition to Rajiv Gandhi Hospital. Doctors said his condition was critical.

Driver Gunasekharan of the A51 route bus was taken into custody, which is rather strange considering none in his position could have avoided the collision with the bike that suddenly fell in front of his vehicle.