‘Allow us to go on this trip’ – K’taka accident victims’ last words

By N. B. Hombal Davangere/Dharwad, Jan 16 : In a major road mishap, at least 13 people, including 11 women, were killed and six others were critically injured when a tempo traveller collided with a truck near Itigatti village in Karnataka’s Dharwad district on Friday morning.
Call it fate or a stroke of bad luck, eleven women passengers who met their tragic end and six of them who are still critical are friends from their childhood days and studied in same school – Saint Paul School – a popular convent school in Davangere district.
Premise of this trip was that they all wanted to relive their school days once again. They wanted to visit the same place, Goa, as they had done in their school days.
Apparently the accident took place, just a few minutes away from their scheduled stop at Dharwad, where they were supposed to get down at one of their friend’s farm house to have breakfast and refresh and proceed ahead to Goa.
But unfortunately, their leisure trip turned out to be their last trip.
Among the deceased, Preethi Ravikumar is daughter-in-law of former BJP MLA Gurusiddana Gouda while her husband Ravikumar is a well-known doctor in the district and owns a hospital, while another deceased Veena Mattihalli Prakash is a well-known gynaecologist and married to a doctor from the same district whereas Paramjyothi is a relative of former Karnataka CM J. H. Patel.