When a Pernambut-bound private bus from Kuppam in Andhra Pradesh
stopped at the Venkatagiri Kota bus terminus in Chittoor on Thursday,
the passengers started complaining about the snail's pace at which the
vehicle had been driven for more than 15 minutes. They blamed the driver
for the delay.
However, when the bus failed to move 30
minutes after the halt, they began searching for the driver, only to be
told that he had died of a cardiac arrest. He had driven slowly and
his last deed was to ensure the safety of the 35 passengers on board.
A
Venkatesan (41), a resident of Erikuthi in Pernambut, was behind the
wheel of the bus when moments after leaving Kuppam he began feeling
uneasy. Kuppam circle-inspector M Rajasekhar told New Indian Express
that Venkatesan informed the conductor that he was not feeling well.
"However, he did not clearly state that he had chest pain. After
developing the pain, he still managed to drive the bus till the terminus
at a slow pace to avoid any mishap, saving about 30 passengers on the
bus," Rajasekhar added.
The private bus service between Kuppam and
Pernambut was managed twice a day by Raman Travels. According to
Saravanan, one of the passengers, the bus started from Kuppam at 3 pm.
The passengers did not find anything unusual initially. “However, after a
while, the vehicle began to crawl at a snail's pace and halted at V
Kota bus terminus,” he said.
Citing an eye-witness account, police
officials said the driver got down from the bus and within a few
minutes collapsed near a tea stall there. The conductor and a passerby
took him to a private hospital in V Kota, but he was declared dead on
arrival.
The body was sent to the Government Palamaner Hospital in
Chittoor district for an autopsy. Venkatesan is survived by three sons
and a daughter. While one of his sons is two-year-old, the other two
sons and the daughter study at a private school in Pernambut.
Courtesy: The New Indian Express
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