Sabarimalai pilgrims from hyderabad die in Tamil nadu

Five Sabarimalai pilgrims, including a boy, from the city died while 13 others suffered grievous injuries when the mini-bus they were travelling in rammed into a stationary lorry at Tanneepandal on the Tiruchy-Chennai national highway in the early hours of Sunday. They were on their way to Tirupati from Sabarimalai.
All the deceased and the injured, residents of BJR Colony in Jammeguda under the Kushaiguda police limits here, had left the city for Sabarimalai on January 8 in the bus.

The news reached the families when Padmachary, one of the injured, called up his family and narrated the incident. Padmachary’s son, Sai Krishna, said, “today morning my father called up and said they met with an accident and could not come for a few days since they were undergoing treatment at a hospital.”
The deceased were identified as Nachikethan, 11, Venkatanarayana, 31, Vittal, 45, Yadagiri, 31 and Shankar, 40. All the pilgrims had taken Ayyapa Swamy deeksha (penance), except Nachikethan. He had accompanied his father Harinath Babu, a registered medical practitioner. Harinath fractured his right leg in the accident.
The injured were rushed to a government hospital nearby, while the bodies of the five were shifted to the hospital for autopsy.
A pall of gloom descended on the semi-urban BJR Colony residents as they received news of the accident. Shocked residents of the colony said, 22 Ayyappa devotees from their colony had hired the bus.
Relatives of the victims left for TN in a vehicle to bring the bodies to the city and are expected to arrive by Monday afternoon.