Have Ordered Judicial Probe Into Illegal Mining in Area: CM

The Tipper-Truck Was Being Driven By a 19-Year-Old With No Licence for Operating Heavy Vehicles

- Karam Parkash

PATIALA: Punjab chief minister Bhagwant Mann on Saturday met protesting family members of the seven schoolchildren who died when their SUV was hit by a tipper-truck on the Patiala-Samana state highway and assured them of a probe into the May 8 accident.

Mann said that he would order a high-level probe into the plying of overloaded tipper-trucks that were being misused for illegal sand mining. "I've already ordered the transport and police departments to conduct a statewide drive to check the licences of truck drivers and fitness certificates of heavy vehicles. Most tipper-trucks are overloaded. I hope that the sacrifice of these children won't go in vain, and we will unearth the nexus of illegal mining," the chief minister said.