Mumbai: Four labourers were killed on the spot while three were grievously injured when they were knocked down by a truck in Virar on the Mumbai-Ahmedabad Highway around 3 am on Saturday.
The Virar police have seized the truck but the driver, who had managed to run away, was later arrested by the Virar police and was slapped with relevant sections of the Indian Penal Code.
A group of seven labourers were on their way to their villages in Rajasthan on foot when the Gujarat police turned them away on Friday night at Bhilad (Gujarat-Maharashtra border) and the group decided to return to their shanties in Vasai.
While four of them died on the spot, three others sustained serious injuries and were rushed to a nearby hospital, he said. The deceased were identified as Ramesh Mangilal Bhat (55), Nikhil Pandya (32), Naresh Kalasuva (18) and Kaluram Bagore (18).
The seven were among thousands of daily wage labourers who were rendered jobless by the 21-day lockdown imposed across the country to check the spread of coronavirus.
Highway authorities had turned off street lights on the Mumbai-Ahmedabad highway and the area where the accident took place was in total darkness, police said.
For many construction site labourers from Gujarat and Rajasthan, the only choice left after the lockdown has been to walk back to their villages in the absence of any transport.
Maharashtra continues to have the highest number of Covid-19 infected people at 159 while the total number of infections in the country has crossed 800.
(With inputs from PTI)
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