‘I had no money to feed my children’

Ramana Yedkundal can never forget January 21, 2009. The day she had devoted to prayer ended with her life in tatters.

Ramana Yedkundal (30) can never forget January 21, 2009. The day she had devoted to prayer ended with her life in tatters.

HT Image

Her husband was among two people who died after a drunken driver lost control of his car and careened into a group returning from a mass at Bandra-Kurla Complex. Yedkundal was badly injured herself.

Recalling the horror, Yedkundal said: “When it was time to return from the mass, there were no rickshaws or buses available so we decided to walk to the station. Suddenly, this speeding car hit me from behind. I suffered multiple fractures as the impact threw me into the air and I landed on the footpath nearby,” said Yedkundal.

“I lost my husband and have permanent shoulder problems because a rich kid chose to drive after drinking,” said Yedkundal, who had to return to her village in Karnataka after the tragedy. That was why she could not be photographed for this report.

“I had no place to go and no income to feed my two children,” she said. “Why don’t people realise that drink driving may take others’ lives as well as their own?”