PANAJI
- A series of accidents that rocked the State in the first four months of the year predominantly involved self-accidents. Two particularly disturbing mishaps involved deaths of young car drivers at Caranzalem and Utorda
- In the first incident, Sujay Surlakar, a young chartered accountant, was tragically charred to death after his Honda City collided with a parked car, which ignited a fire to engulf his vehicle along with other parked vehicles. His body was burnt beyond recognition and his identification was possible based on ID cards retrieved from the car. The Fire personnel had to cut open the car to remove his body, which was subsequently sent for medical formalities and handed over to his grieving family
- While it’s been over 45 days since this case, another accident left everyone perplexed. A 23-year-old youth from Utorda, Mac Arthur Pereira, lost his life in a head-on collision. Pereira, who was returning home from a party around 6am, purportedly fell asleep at the wheel which resulted in his car colliding with a goods carrier vehicle.
- Superintendent of Police (Traffic) Bossuet Silva, in a recent conversation with The Goan regarding the rising accident rate, claimed that the majority of accidents are self-accidents. “We are enforcing the law but the people should also follow the traffic rules. Most of the accidents are self-accidents,” he said
- Not too long ago, three Goan footballers, Rowlin Borges, Glan Martins, and Jaison Vaz were involved in a self-accident last month. They had a lucky escape although Vaz suffered injuries to his neck and ribs while Martins and Rowlin did not require hospitalization. This accident too was a result of the driver falling asleep while travelling from Mapusa to Panaji. It collided with a parked truck near Delfino's market, Porvorim
- One self-accident on Atal Setu claimed the life of a policeman. While the Traffic Department is compiling exact figures of the accidents and factors that contributed to road crashes this year, sources said, nearly half of these are self-accidents, most of which have resulted in fatalities
- While there are cases of drivers dozing off at the wheel, drunken driving is on the rise. In another mishap, an Indian Navy staff was arrested for allegedly running over a pedestrian Manoj Shashidharan a native of Kerala at Merces. The accused driver was returning from a casino in a drunken state when he knocked down the victim who was in the housekeeping business and living in Merces for several years
