Report and Pics by Mounesh Vishwakarma
Daijiworld Media Network – Bantwal (RD/SP)
 
Bantwal, Mar 23: A bullet tanker, carrying the load of petroleum products, lost control and rolled over opposite the Sujeer temple, near here on Bangalore – Mangalore National Highway (NH) 48 at about 7.30 am on Monday March 23. 
 
The tanker first hit a Tata Indica car coming from the opposite direction and then rolled over at Sujeer near here on Monday morning.  As a result, the tanker driver Balakrishna Gowda (35), a resident of Mani near here was critically injured. The driver of Tata Indica car survived with minor injuries. 

Sources said, the owner of Tata Indica was driving towards Vittal from Mangalore, while the tanker was plying from Bangalore to Mangalore petrochemicals yard when the mishap occurred on NH 48 at Sujir, near here. 
 
The traffic on either side of NH 48 was stalled for some time till Bantwal rural sub inspector T D Nagaraj arrived on the spot along with the traffic police.  They diverted the traffic via Maripalla and Melkar, a longer route, to reach Mangalore.  The passengers of many inter city and long distance passenger buses were stranded till the traffic was restored by clearing the tanker from the spot.  The students appearing for the PUC exams were very much inconvenienced owing to the mishap.