A road mishap that incapacitated two cousins

Nikhil Bhardwaj

Tribune News Service

Jalandhar, May 7

Fate could not have been more unkind to these poor cousins who were hit by a speeding car on Saturday evening last week and now have had to undergo amputations of their limbs.

Working as a mechanic at Beas village near Bhogpur here to make his and his widow mother’s ends meet, Balwinder Kumar (25) lost his left arm as well as his left leg, rendering him unfit to take up the same avocation again. Even more tragic is the fact that the accident occurred at a time when he was engaged and was to get married in just about two months.

Balwinder was driving his bike and was on way to drop his cousin Sonia (35) and her son Jashan (6), residents of Fojji Mohalla, Hoshiarpur. As they had just started from their village, a speeding Indica car, bearing number JK-02 BG 6450, hit both of them. The impact of the accident was so much that Sonia’s left arm got chopped off and she was dragged by the car-borne persons for about 1 km, where a dhaba owner saw them thrown off.

As the owner raised an alarm, villagers gathered there and tried to chase the car, the tyres of which got flattened in the mishap, enabling the villagers to gherao the culprits and nab them.

It’s agony for Sonia as well, as her husband died of some ailment more than a year after her marriage and she has been putting up with her parents and her child in Hoshiarpur. Choosing not to depend on them to raise her son, she had been working as an assistant in a drug store there. But her woes just did not end there. With her arm amputated and surgery in her leg, she is not sure whether she would be fit to get employed again. Her son too has undergone surgery in his leg.

Sonia recalls, “I just remember that after getting hit, I got thrown off very high. After that I lost my consciousness and know only what the villagers or eye-witnesses have told me in hospital. I was holding a purse and my phone in my left arm, which have been recovered by the police in the car from the accused.”

Sonia’s mother added, “She was nowhere to be seen around the accident spot as she had fallen of hundreds of metres away on roadside, bleeding profusely. Till she was finally searched and her arm had been located, it was too late for the doctors to make a corrective surgery.”

Villagers contributing for treatment of victims

Families of the victims said the support of residents of Beas villagers had been immense. Over Rs 7 lakh had been collected so far. “Had they all not come together at the spot, two lives could have been lost. It was they who managed to nab the accused and handed them over to the police. It was on their pressure that the accused were forced to shell out Rs 1.8 lakh, most of which has gone for the treatment of the trio on the first day itself. Since then, each house in the village has pitched in to make small monetary contribution for us in the time of need,” said Balwinder’s sister.

Jammu cop was driving car

The Alto car was being driven by a constable of the Jammu police, Kuljinder Singh, a resident of Jhakhar near Udhampur in Jammu. SHO Bhogpur Bharat Masih said Kuljinder, who was driving the car, was in an inebriated state and his speeding car hit the bike-borne cousins badly. He was arrested by the police.

Family seeks financial help

Dharminder, cousin of Balwinder, said since Balwinder’s limbs got amputated, he would not be in a state to earn proper livelihood and even his cousin Sonia, who was a widow and was earning bread for herself and her child alone, had also gone jobless. “We earnestly appeal to society at large to come forward to help the victims and their families with financial support.”