Bus driver travelled 7km on wrong carriageway before crash on Delhi-Meerut e-way

A bus driving on the wrong side of the road collided head-on with a private vehicle on the Delhi-Meerut expressway, killing six people

The bus that crashed head-on into a private vehicle on the Delhi-Meerut expressway on Tuesday morning, killing six people, had entered the wrong carriageway near Indirapuram and was driven on the wrong side of the road for more than 7km before the fatal accident near Behrampur in Ghaziabad at around 6am, National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) officials aware of the incident said.

The accident was caught on CCTV cameras installed along the expressway. (HT PHOTO)

The accident was caught on CCTV cameras installed along the expressway. In the 15-second footage, at least two cars skirt past the bus, which is on the wrong side of the road, before the bus collides with the Mahindra TUV 300.

The police said that eight people were travelling in the car, of which six died —Narendra Yadav, 45, his wife Anita, 42, their two sons, Deepanshu, 17, and Himanshu, 14. Narendra’s younger brother Dharmendra, 40, was also in car and lost his wife Babita, 37, and their daughter Vanshika, 8.

Dharmendra and his son Kartik, 5, were the only survivors, officers said.

Ghaziabad police said the bus driver, identified as Prem Pal Singh, was booked under Indian Penal Code sections 304 (culpable homicide not amounting to murder), 308 (attempt to commit culpable homicide), and 427 (causing damages).

NHAI officials said that they were unable to spot the speeding bus as its patrolling vehicles were at different locations, and could not have entered the wrong carriageway to stop the errant driver, and squarely placed the blame for the accident on the traffic police.

“The only way the bus could have been stopped was by way of enforcement by the traffic police on duty. The vehicle entered (the wrong carriageway) from chainage at 9.6km of DME (Delhi-Meerut expressway), which is near Indirapuram, and travelled high speed up to chainage 16.8km, which is the accident site. We have two patrolling vehicles which are in regular duty. But these vehicles could not have gone on the wrong side of the road to stop the bus, and they were not near the location at that moment,” an NHAI official said, declining to be named.

The NHAI official cited CCTV footage from the expressway for determining the spot from which the bus entered the wrong carriageway, and said that the authority cannot deploy its personnel at entry/exit points on the expressway due to the potential risk from vehicles travelling at high speeds.

The speed limit on the expressway is 100kmph, and the NHAI official said the SUV was being driven at around 90kmph.

The Ghaziabad traffic police, however, said that the bus had entered the wrong carriageway of the expressway near Ghazipur in Delhi — around 9km away from the accident spot. Police officers also revealed that the bus, which bore a Noida registration plate, had 19 different challans issued against it since 2018.

“The driver of the bus has been arrested and an FIR is also lodged against him. We will clarify the spot from where the bus entered the expressway and it will be a part of the investigation. We have come across 19 different challans involving the bus for traffic violations in Noida. The violations include parking on the wrong side of the road, driving without a seat belt, and over speeding,” said Ravi Prakash Singh, assistant commissioner of police (ACP) (Wave city).

Suniti, DCP (traffic) in Noida, said, “We have come across several violations involving the bus and our officials are checking the antecedents of the bus and also the driver.”

Singh said the impact of the collision was such that the front of the Mahindra TUV was completely crushed.

“The bus was being driven on the wrong side at a high speed and it hit the car primarily on the driver’s side. Thereafter the two vehicles came to halt. The TUV was completely crushed and six persons died on the spot. We had to rope in cutter machines to pull out the injured from the car,” he said.

Separately, the Ghaziabad police said that though the bus was painted yellow and had the words “school bus” written on it, the vehicle was actually being used to ferry employees of a private company.

“There are several instances which have come to light in which school buses also ferry employees of private companies. We conduct regular drives to stop this practice, and more will be carried out soon,” said Deepak Shah, additional regional transport officer (enforcement) at Noida’s transport department.