Odia filmmaker critical after car rams into truck

BHUBANESWAR: Three men died and noted Ollywood director Sudhakar Basant sustained grievous injuries in two separate road accidents on Sunday.

Basant's car rammed into a stationary truck near Manguli Chhak in Cuttack in the early hours. Police sources said Basant was seated in the front adjacent to the driver's seat. Basant, his driver and two others were travelling from Baripada to Cuttack when the accident took place, police sources said.

"The car was badly damaged. The intensity of the collision was huge. Fire services personnel rescued the passengers from the mangled car by using gas cutters and rushed them to SCB Medical College and Hospital. Basant's condition was extremely critical. He has not yet regained his consciousness," an officer of the commissionerate police said.

Doctors at the hospital said Basant suffered severe injuries on his head, chest, face and legs. Several actors from the Ollywood thronged the hospital and wished for Basant's quick recovery.

Four persons, including Basant, were returning from a shoot in Mayurbhanj on Saturday," said actor Shakti Baral. The other three passengers are stable, doctors said.

In another accident, a speeding truck hit a two-wheeler at Ranital in Bhadrak district in the morning, when there was dense fog. The biker and two pillion riders were taken to Bhadrak district headquarters hospital. While two of them were declared dead on arrival, the third victim died of injuries during treatment.

"We are trying to arrest the truck driver who fled with the vehicle. Identities of the three deceased are being ascertained," a police officer said.