A father collapses, mothers in shock, villages in mourning

Valiaddun of Kistapur village ran three kilometres to reach the accident site after someone told him that the Kakatiya Techno School bus was rammed by a train.

By the time he reached, few villagers had extracted the bodies of some of the schoolchildren from the mangled vehicle.

It is said he suffered a heart attack as soon as he came to know that his children Gousia (4) and Abdul Rasheed (6), to whom he waved goodbye a few minutes ago, were no more.

Soon after he collapsed,he was rushed to a hospital in Hyderabad for treatment.
The Gundreddipalli village near Toopran is in mourning.

Inconsolable families

The family members of Divya and Charan were inconsolable after they realised that their two kids died in the collision. Suman and Srividya, children of Ramulu, also perished in the accident.

Similarly, a pal of gloom descended on Islampur, Nacaharam, Ghanpur, Venkatayapalli, Gundetipalli, Chetlati- mmayapalli, from where the children come to school by bus, which is one among the seven  others the Kakatiya Techno School runs to pick up students from the rural Toopran mandal and Yeldurty mandal.

Lalitha, mother of Vamsi, a seventh standard student, is in shock. She wakes up only to collapse again and is refusing to shed a tear.

‘Hope is lost’

Sudarshan of Islampur, who lost his son in the incident, is a truck driver and worked hard to send his son to a convent.

“I had no schooling. My son was the only hope our family had. Now, I don’t know what will happen to my life,” he said.

Satyanarayana, grandfather of 14-year-old Vishnu of Islampur, was very attached to his grandson.

“As my son was busy, I was the one who walked with my grandson to the bus. I never suspected that the driver was new. Otherwise, I would have cautioned him about the level crossing,” the old man rued.

Manish Yadav’s father Swamy is an auto-rickshaw driver, eking out a living by shuttling passengers between Toopran and Medchal.

His wife Poshamma is in shock, refusing to believe that her son will not come back home.

As the bodies of their wards will be returning to the villages by night, the parents are gathering strength to face the reality. The burial or cremation is set to take place on Friday.