Aloki’s body recovered from Chila canal, cremated
PrashantNews
The body of Aloki Devi, a warden of the Rajaji National Park who went missing after the grisly Chila accident in Haridwar district of Uttarakhand, was recovered from a canal early on Thursday by a team of State Disaster Response Force (SDRF).
After two days of rigorous searching, the SDRF launched its operation again this morning and found a body floating in the Chila canal near the UJVN’s power house. The body was identified as that of warden Aloki Devi, who along with four others was killed after the interceptor vehicle in which they were travelling met with an accident on Monday.
Later the last rites of Aloki Devi, who was from Srinagar-Pauri, were performed at Kharkari area in Haridwar. Forest Minister Subodh Unniyal also paid wreaths on the body of Devi.
Meanwhile, the Uttarakhand forest department and the state police have started separate probes to find reasons behind the grisly Chila accident where four persons including two forest officials lost their lives and one woman warden went missing. An FIR was lodged against Pravaig Dynamics and Aska companies on Wednesday.
The FIR was lodged in the Laxman Jhula police station against the two companies under section 279/338/30A of the IPC. The interceptor vehicle was produced by Pravaig Dynamics while Aska had customized the four-wheeler.
On the other hand, the driver Ashbin Biju said he was “forced to over-speed” the electric vehicle (EV).
Chief wildlife Warden Samir Sinha said he would look into the administrative part of the probe only. The state police on the other hand will investigate the matter as per the law.
Two forest rangers, died and a woman warden Aloki Devi went missing after their trial Electric Vehicle (EV) had met with an accident in Uttarakhand’s Rajaji Tiger Reserve on Monday.
Meanwhile, the EV startup Pravaig Dynamics has said it is working with the investigating agencies to make more details available. The Bengaluru-based company, in a press statement, said the EV driver Ashbin Biju, who survived the accident, has stated that forest officials “forced him to overload and speed up” during the trial of the all-terrain EV. Biju, BE Mechanical Engineer, who was driving the vehicle claimed, he was neither inebriated nor tired.
The first test drive, approved by the Forest Department of Uttarakhand, happened on Monday morning without any incident but in the second round of demonstration in the afternoon, forest officials forced him to take 9 personnel (a total of 10 including the driver) against the seating capacity of eight (including driver), according to his statement.
“The ranger standing at the rear of the vehicle ordered me to go to the Chilla Dam road… and asked me to go to other off-road obstacles as part of the demonstration,” he said, adding they asked him to “accelerate” despite “my repeated requests to not go outside the planned range”. The driver and the co-passenger in the front, who wore their seat belts, survived the accident, while the rangers and others who were standing in the rear of the vehicle were thrown off and either died or was seriously injured. Ends