Villagers claim the river sucked in a truck loaded with gas cylinders in 2005, and it has not been recovered as yet
Just two years back, an empty tempo and in 2005, a truck stacked with LPG cylinders fell into the same Savitri river, which has sucked in two buses and a Chevrolet Tavera on Tuesday night in the Mahad tragedy. The vehicles are yet to be found.
The tempo was at least recovered by some fishermen during a summer, however the truck or the cylinders are still missing. Taking this into account, the villagers are casting sincere doubt over whether the state transport buses and the Tavera can be at all fished out of the river.
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“The truck fell around a kilometre ahead of the (present) incident spot drowning two people in it. I could not find a truck or any cylinder, even though I swam for more than 3 kilometres. The tempo fell almost 4 kilometres from the Dadli Bridge, which again killed two people. A landslide caused the fall,” said Krishna Gangaram Lad, a farmer living in Navenagar, which is hardly a kilometre away from the accident spot.
The 53-year-old Lad takes pride in his knowledge about the river having spent his whole life in the village. “Roaming around in the fields to feed the cattle, swimming in the river and fishing has given me this hands-on experience of its depth. This is the reason why people approach me for rescuing anybody who has drowned. I never refuse,” said Lad, who is currently helping in the rescue operation and claims to have found three bodies till now.
The rescue agencies initially nudged him away when he offered to help but budged owing to his experience.
20 crocodiles found
On Thursday, locals claimed to have spotted crocodiles, which are believed to be impeding the rescue operations. Lad echoed it adding that they are harmless.
“We found more than 20 crocodiles around the boundaries. They go inside the water if they see any movement or hear the sound of boats, but they have never harmed anyone. The rescuers are however taking precautions,” added Lad.
Another local farmer who has been helping in the search operation is a 40-something Sanjay More, who suspects whether the buses at all have passed the Dadli bridge.
“I assume that the gaps between the pillars underneath Dadli Bridge is almost 4 kilometres. The ST buses cannot pass through that gap, so we suspect those are in the radius of 3 to 4 kilometres,” said More, adding that during summer the water level is so low that a bamboo stick measuring 20-feet touches the riverbed.
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