Two undergraduate students were among three persons who died when two vehicles collided head-on in the city in wee hours on Tuesday. The students in a taxi were hit by a rashly driven luxury car Audi around 3 in the morning at the Sector 17-18 light Point. Police identified the deceased as Sahil Juneja (20), a student of Bachelors of Business Management, Kuldeep Singh (19) was a student of B Tech Hast Bahadur and the driver of taxi was a resident of Dharampur. While two of them Shikhar Rastogi and Raunak Singh received injuries.
A group of students had gone to Shimla and Kasauli and were returning to Chandigarh for their onward journey to Ghaziabad when the mishap occurred. The occupants in the Audi Car fled from the spot after the accident.
The collision took place between a taxi and the Audi. The deceased were passengers of the taxi whereas the car was completely mangled after the high-impact collision, police said.
The students had come to Chandigarh to board a bus to their home town Ghaziabad from ISBT Sector-17.
“Our taxi bearing Himachal number (HP-01-S-3900) was hit by a rashly driven brown colour Audi car bearing Chandigarh number (CH-01-AD-5791) near ISBT Sector-17. The person driving his car on the wrong side, hit our taxi from front which left us badly injured,” said Shikhar Rastogi who survived the accident.
A police team reached the spot and rushed victims to the GMSH Sector-16, from where they were referred to PGIMER. Doctors of PGIMER declared three of them as brought dead, while two of them received injuries.
Police sources said the accused was driving the car on the wrong side and there was also a lady in the Audi. Shikhar said they had gone for a weeklong holiday to Kasauli and had hired a taxi to ferry them to Chandigarh, from where they were supposed to get a bus for Ghaziabad.
Sanjay Kumar, the brother of deceased driver said that, Hast Bahadur, who recently became father of a girl child was the only earning hand for his family. “It will be very difficult for us to bring up his two daughters now,” he added.
Ashish Kapoor, DSP/Central, UT police said that the accused car driver has been traced as a resident of Sector-4 Panchkula. He said the case is being investigated and the accused has not yet been arrested.