Chennamma Hotel: Blood spills on perilous incline

HYDERABAD: At least 10 individuals, including actor Ravi Teja's brother Bharath Raj, died in separate accidents on the deadly Chennamma Hotel stretch on the Outer Ring Road near Kothwalguda in the past few months.
Though it is one of the most accident-prone stretches, police, in Bharath's case, said the actor was at fault for driving at high speed in the extreme left lane of the eight-lane carriageway , reserved for slowmoving vehicles.
As the road was constructed by levelling a hill, a motorist has to first go up the steep road and then descend. If a vehicle is either parked or breaks down, motorists might get the impression that the vehicle is also moving. Only when they near the vehicle do drivers realise it is stationary . This has many a times led to accidents.
“So many accidents have taken place on this stretch just because motorists wrongly judge the vehicle ahead is moving.Since the road has an acclivity , motorists speed to keep up momentum, but it is often too late to control speed when one realises the vehicle ahead is stationary ,a cop said.
Traffic police clarified there was no engineering defect on the stretch where the accident took place, but accidents occur at regular intervals near Chennamma Hotel. “There used to be complaints of lack of lighting. Now, the entire stretch is properly lit,'' RGIA traffic inspector D Bhaskar Reddy told TOI. This indicates most accidents are happening now due to human error, he said.