Mangaluru: Few days ago, eight school children were killed and 12 persons injured, including the driver of the minivan and his school teacher wife, after a private bus collided with a school van on NH 66 in the coastal Karnataka district of Udupi.
Vehicles entering from the wrong side near Yekkur
Opposite to Fisheries college in Mangaluru on NH 66 is Kendriya Vidyalaya school at Yekkur. The highway has just been completed on this stretch. Those vehicles entering the highway from Yekkur and wanting to go towards Pumpwell (Mahaveer Circle) will have to go up to Yenepoya school and take a U turn. Instead many vehicles take the risk of entering the highway on the wrong side and proceed towards Pumpwell.
Anxious parents, who spoke to newskarnataka, said, “The memory of those eight school children of Don Bosco school who were killed near Udupi in an accident because of a speeding bus, has not faded even a bit from our minds. So we want a traffic police to be posted, throughout the day, to stop vehicles from entering the highway on the wrong side. We want to prevent another such accident from happening at the KV school junction.
This reporter had called up ACP Uday Naik to intimate the worry and concern of the parents who come to drop their children at KV in Yekkur and a little further at Yenepoya School. The parents pointed to a number of school vans that come to these two schools to drop and pick students.
Several students, teachers and parents on foot, cross the highway a number of times when the KV school gets over, to catch the city bus going towards Statebank. Presently the private security appointed by the KV school at Yekkur helps the children, teachers and parent to cross the highway.