Navi Mumbai: As many as 15 vehicles skidded and piled-up on the Sion-Panvel highway near Kharghar due to spillage of oil and grease sludge from a dumper truck, transporting the material without taking necessary precautions on Thursday around 8 pm.Two beat marshal constables attached to Kharghar traffic unit were also injured as their bike skidded when they reached the spot to clear the traffic snarl.Acting on a complaint by one of the injured constables identified as Satish Kale (55), Kharghar police have registered a case against the accused dumper driver Sanjay Kumar Bharti (42), who hails from UP. The other injured constable has been identified as Kiran Kadam (47). The accused has been booked under relevant sections of the BNS and Motor Vehicle Act for rash or negligent driving on a public way that endangers human life or poses a risk of injury to others, negligent conduct with respect to machinery and dangerous driving. Kadam said, “On Thursday around 8 pm, while Kadam and I were on beat marshal duty, we received a wireless message about pile-up of multiple vehicles near Kharghar skywalk on the highway due to skidding after spillage of oil and grease from a dumper. As we rushed to the spot, huge quantity of solid sludge of oil and grease material was found fallen on the road and had some spillage for about 20 metres. Our bike skidded on the spillage and we both sustained minor injuries.” Kadam said, “Despite sustaining injuries, we still streamlined the traffic movement. The senior officers of Kharghar police station, Kharghar traffic unit and DCP traffic Tirupati Kakade also reached the spot to take stock of the situation of traffic snarl. The drivers of the vehicles involved in the pile-up were told to lodge a complaint, if they wanted to, but they travelled ahead. As the body cameras provided to us by the traffic department were damaged in the mishap, an FIR was lodged by constable Kale against the accused dumper driver.”Kale said, “The dumper driver was transporting the sludge material from ONGC, Uran, to Baroda, that too without taking necessary safety precautions by not storing it in any barrel or plastic sacks. The driver claimed that during the journey, the dumper’s carriage got unlocked and the sludge material spilled along the stretch of highway, that he was unaware of.”
