New Delhi: The role of the local civilian driver will be scrutinized during the Court of Inquiry (CoI) investigation that will probe the tragic bus mishap that took place on Friday morning near Thoise, a military airfield base in Ladakh. The driver - a local civilian named Ahmed Shah - escaped with minor injuries after he jumped out from the bus before it skidded off the road and fell 50-60 feet into the Shyok river.
A state police source told ETV Bharat: “An FIR has been lodged on the accident on Saturday. Prima facie, it looks to be a case of negligent driving and that the accident was not intentional. But that is a matter for the investigation to probe and draw conclusions from.” It is standard procedure to file FIRs after such accidents, as is the ordering of a CoI by the military. The bus was hired under the Civilian Hired Transport provision and was ferrying a total of 26 soldiers for their first deployment to the Siachen glacier.
The ill-fated bus was part of an Indian Army convoy and was travelling from the army transit camp in Partapur to a forward location in Sub Sector Hanif located in the Siachen. While seven Indian Army soldiers died in the crash, the rest 19 were injured, some seriously, who were all airlifted to the military base hospital in Chandimandir, near Chandigarh. Of those evacuated to Chandimandir, five were P1 or Priority Level 1 indicative of those in imminent danger of collapsing and requiring immediate medical attention, while three were critical. According to sources, although three of the injured soldiers were immediately operated on, all 19 were stable when the last reports came in.
The site of the incident which took place at about 9 AM on Friday morning, is located at about 12,000 feet altitude in the Turtuk sector and is in a treacherous stretch with the Shyok river way beneath on one side and a steep cliff wall on the other side. Driving in such places is a constant battle against the elements of nature. Besides extreme cold, the very high altitude air is rarified with depleted oxygen which causes confusion in the mind leading to tardy reactions.
The Siachen Ridge is called the world’s highest battlefield where Indian Army soldiers face the Pakistani army on one side and China’s People’s Liberation Army on the other. Soon after the accident, Prime Minister Narendra Modi tweeted: “Anguished by the bus accident in Ladakh in which we have lost our brave army personnel. My thoughts are with the bereaved families. I hope those injured recover at the earliest. All possible assistance is being given to the affected.”
Read: 9 soldiers killed, several injured after army vehicle falls into Shyok river in Ladakh
