Four people injured while travelling from Boripadi to Pune on Solapur Pune highway

Four passengers were injured while they were travelling by car from Boripadi to Pune on the Pune-Solapur highway as a Bolero hit them from behind. The passengers were supposed to board train number 01522 Daund-Hadapsar DEMU which was scheduled to depart from Daund at 6.10 am but was delayed by 1.5 hours. As a result, the passengers had no other option but to travel by road in order to reach their offices on time. 

The victims are identified as Sachin Parkhe, Suresh Tadge, Nivedita Dongare, and Sarika Jadhav. As per information, they were travelling in a Maruti Alto car when the impact occurred. The impact was so strong that the rear end of the vehicle was completely bent and the rear glass was completely shattered. The passengers were left stranded inside the vehicle for some time. Following the collision with the Maruti car, the driver of the Bolero attempted to flee but was detained by Sachin Parkhe (the car’s owner) and Suresh Tadge, who then turned them over to the Yevat police.

One of the passengers claimed that the Bhekrainagar resident Patil, the tempo driver, was extremely drunk, not conscious, and unable to even stand unassisted. When they confronted him, he even stated that, because he is Islamic, he doesn’t drink alcohol at all. When his senior,  the tempo’s owner in Kolhapur, was called shortly after, he stated he did not employ drunk individuals to drive. Following negotiations, the owner consented to pay for 70% of the vehicle’s damage.

Tadge said, “DAUND-PUNE” local train travel has become a serious matter. On one hand, the frequency of local trains is low, trains do not leave on time, and trains have been terminating at the Hadapsar station instead of Pune station. So we need to again spend our expenses on further travel. Therefore, students often miss their early classes and many workers like us, have to unintentionally be late for our work. This is a problem that we’ve been facing since the last one and a half years, post-COVID. We tried complaining to many Railway officials and even politicians like Supriya Sule and Rahul Kolhe (MLA – Daund). I cannot describe how difficult this is for us.”

“I’ve been commuting daily for over 30 years via this route. Me and Sarika work at the Poona Hospital. We have to spend additional hours every day to further reach Pune Station and then our workplace. I come from a poor financial background and it’s very difficult for me to spend money here unnecessarily. In these inflation days, we cannot even afford a healthy meal daily. After questioning the authorities about why the train stops midway at Hadapsar, they claimed some maintenance work was taking place at Pune Station that prohibits them from ending the train journey at the last stop. But why are all the other trains deported at Pune Station and not just ours? Many trains are not even back on track post-COVID and no one is paying attention to our issues, it’s disheartening,” expressed a passenger, Nivedita Dongre.

“Many passengers are demanding that the “Daund-Pune-Daund” suburban local should be started at the earliest. The Railway ministry should introduce Pune-Daund Suburban DEMU Local services at the earliest because already Central Railway Headquarters, Pune Railway Division, many Railway Union, and political representatives have demanded for Suburban EMU local but still no action has been taken.” – Pune Gramin Railway Pravasi Group.

Dnyanada Sagare