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Man recounts Jaipur LPG crash horror: ‘Recognised sister's body by toe ring’
Jaipur tank crash: Basram's sister Anita, a police constable with the Rajasthan Armed Constabulary (RAC), was among the victims of the deadly LPG tanker fire.
Basram Meena’s world came crashing down on the morning of December 20, as his sister, Anita Meena, died in the Jaipur tanker-truck accident fire. He identified his sister's body with her toe ring after a six-hour-long search.
His sister, Anita Meena, a police constable with the Rajasthan Armed Constabulary (RAC), was among the victims of the deadly LPG tanker fire on the Jaipur-Ajmer national highway. She had been travelling from Dudu to Jaipur to report for duty when the bus she was on caught fire in the crash.
Meena's harrowing journey began on Friday morning when Basram received a call from his brother-in-law (Anita’s husband), informing him that Anita had not been answering her phone, a TOI report said.
READ | Jaipur crash: ‘Broke window, jumped... ran for my life’
“I had already seen the news, so I rushed to the accident site, hoping to find her there,” TOI quoted him as saying, adding that despite scouring the area, he could not locate his sister.
On failing to find any leads on the site of the crash, Basram went to the burn ward of SMS Hospital, approximately 13 kilometres away hoping for a miracle.
Desperate and running out of options, Basram finally looked for his sister's mortuary, where he came face-to-face with his worst nightmare.
“I recognised her by her toe ring,” he said.
“Her body was severely burned and unrecognizable. I had a picture of her wearing the toe ring, and that’s how I was able to identify her,” he added.
What happened at Jaipur-Ajmer highway on Friday?
An LPG tanker collided with a truck on Friday, sparking a massive fireball that turned a stretch of the Jaipur-Ajmer highway into an inferno in which 14 people died and nearly 40 vehicles were engulfed in flames.
More than 30 people who suffered burn injuries in the massive crash are undergoing treatment.
According to the experts, incomplete construction, sudden cuts and a lack of traffic sense might have caused the Jaipur-Ajmer highway accident. They also called for a comprehensive statewide road safety action plan.
