A Selvaraj
9-Dec-2012
CHENNAI: The few people waiting at the Thiruvottiyur bus terminus at 12.15am on
Saturday were stunned to see a man jump into the driver's seat of a parked MTC
bus and drive it into shops and a parked cab. Later it turned out the
45-year-old 'driver' was a mentally ill man.
Police are yet to confirm his identity, though he later gave his name as
Vaidyalingam. MTC employees and shopkeepers in the locality said they had seen
him roaming the area in the past two months. "We don't know how he started the
bus," a police officer said.
The MTC bus (TN 01 N 9814) was parked at the terminus after the driver retired
for the night. Witnesses told police they saw a man getting behind the wheel
and starting the vehicle. He drove for about 300 metres before ramming the bus
into two shops and a call taxi parked by the road. There were only a few people
at the terminus, and no one was injured.
Police said when MTC employees got into the crashed bus, they found the man in
the driver's seat, apparently unperturbed by the commotion he had caused. MTC
employees handed the man over to police. An eyewitness told officers that the
bus was parked diagonal to the shops facing the exit of the terminus.
"The bus started with a jerk and moved fast. It hit a mobile recharge shop,
then a kiosk and later a Fast Track call taxi on the road side," police quoted
the eyewitness as saying. One side of the car was damaged. The two shops came
down in the impact. Based on a complaint from kiosk owner M Umapathy, 35, of
Vedhachalam Avenue in Thiruvottiyur, police registered a case. After
preliminary inquiries, police suspect that the safety switch was not locked, so
the man simply had to press the 'start' button near the steering wheel to bring
the engine to life.
"We are probing whether the MTC driver or someone else had made a shortcut
connection of wires," the police officer said. MTC managing director T P
Rajendran called it a very unusual mishap. "We have ordered a departmental
probe and will take action if any MTC employee is found to be at fault."
http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2012-12-09/chennai/35704921_1_mtc-bus-mentally-ill-man-t-p-rajendran
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