From the archive record
At least seventeen people were killed and over 40 injured early Sunday morning after a bus reportedly hit two cars and fell into a 20-feet deep ditch on the Mumbai-Pune Expressway. The accident took place at around 5.30 am. A Swift had stopped on the side of the Mumbai-Pune Expressway as the driver was changing a punctured tyre. An Innova car had stopped in the first lane to help the driver. A luxury bus, coming from Satara, crashed into the Innova and the Desire and fell into a 20-feet deep ditch. Innova driver Ashish Patil, who was returning to Mumbai from Lonavla along with his friends, is the complainant in the case. In his statement to the police, he said, “Near Shivkar village on the expressway, we saw a Swift car (MH 02 CL 1480) waiting on the side of the road. The driver of the car