Four dead in highway pile-up in Karnataka
Ballari (Karnataka) (PTI): At least four people are feared dead and some others were injured in a pile-up involving a bus, a garlic-laden lorry, a car and multiple two-wheelers near Danapur in Hospet taluk of Vijayanagara district on National Highway 50 on Saturday morning, police said.
According to police sources, the accident began as a minor collision but escalated when the speeding lorry rammed into a bike and subsequently crashed into a bus and a car before overturning.
The lorry fell onto the car and dragged it for nearly 100 metres after the impact, police said.
Preliminary inquiry suggests the driver was transporting garlic towards Chitradurga and was driving at high speed, leading to loss of control and a chain collision.
“The four occupants of the car are feared to have died on the spot after the lorry toppled onto the vehicle,” police sources said, adding that some people sustained injuries, some of them serious.
Rescue operations were underway to clear the overturned vehicle and retrieve those trapped.
The injured have been shifted to government hospitals in Hospet and Koppal for treatment, they added.
Vehicular movement on National Highway 50 was severely affected, with traffic piling up for several kilometres as locals gathered at the accident site and emergency teams intensified relief efforts.
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ED raids Kolkata Police deputy commissioner, businessman in PMLA probe
Kolkata (PTI): The Enforcement Directorate on Sunday conducted raids at the premises of Kolkata Police Deputy Commissioner Shantanu Sinha Biswas and a local businessman as part of a money laundering probe against an alleged criminal and his linked syndicate in the poll-bound state, officials said.
Two premises of Biswas, including his residence in Ballygunge area and one location of the businessman named Joy Kamdar, Managing Director of a company named Sun Enterprise, have been raided under the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).
Kamdar has been taken by the officials to the local ED office for questioning. Biswas, chief coordinator and nodal officer of the West Bengal and Kolkata Police welfare committee, was not present at his premises, they said.
The action is linked to a money laundering case against an alleged local criminal named Biswajit Podder alias Sona Pappu, who is booked in multiple cases on charges of attempted murder and extortion.
The federal probe agency had conducted the first round of searches in this case on April 1.
The ED had then seized cash of Rs 1.47 crore apart from gold jewellery and silver valued at Rs 67.64 lakh and a country-made revolver from some premises that were searched.
The probe stems from a Kolkata Police FIR against against Podder for his alleged involvement in rioting, attempt to murder, criminal conspiracy and Arms Act violations. The accused, including Podder, were engaged in organised criminal syndicate activities in the state of West Bengal and generated funds illegally by way of syndicate operations, the ED said in a statement on April 9.
Podder is also wanted by the police in a case of violence in Kankulia road near Golpark of Kolkata and is currently on the run.
The ED has issued summons to Podder but he has failed to join the investigation so far, according to the agency.
West Bengal will have a two phase poll on April 23 and April 29.
