THRISSUR: In a tragic accident, two visually-challenged cricket players were crushed to death by a low-floor AC bus of the Kerala Urban Road Transport Corporation (KURTC) at the bus stand here on Sunday morning. The deceased were identified as Ratheesh, 29, and Vinod, 32, members of blind cricket team Dragon Stars based in Palakkad.
The two cricketers were on their way to attend an administrative meet to be held at Kochi when the incident happened. While Ratheesh is a native of Cheruplassery, Vinod hailed from Thrithala respectively.
“Ratheesh was captain of the team and Vinod was a member. They were on their way to attend a blind cricket administrative meet to be held at Kochi, to decide which all tournaments would be held this year,” said Sulaiman, the manager of the cricket team.
Ratheesh was blind with light perception while Vinod was partially devoid of sight. “Vinod, although he could not recognise faces, could walk around without difficulty,” he said.
The family of Ratheesh said he had left home and met up with Vinod at Shoranur, before continuing on their way to Kochi. “The next thing we heard was that an accident had occurred at the KSRTC stand,” said Manikantan, Ratheesh’s cousin.
The mishap occurred at around 9 am on Sunday. The KURTC AC low floor bus on its way to Palakkad rammed into a wall on account of driver error. The state-run KURTC operates more than 500 low-floor buses.
According to traffic police, the bus driver Hamsa from the Palakkad depot, accidentally shifted into a wrong gear while trying to reverse the vehicle. The police have taken Hamsa into custody.
“The stand was relatively less crowded on account of it being a Sunday morning. This lessened the gravity of the disaster,” a police official told Express.
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