CUTTACK: When 21-year-old Mihir Mishra got a job recently, his family's joys knew no bound. The Mishras were hopeful that a steady income would help change things for the better. That was not to be. Last Saturday, Mihir's shoulder was pierced by a long bamboo protruding out of an overladen hand-driven trolley, as he made his way home from work on his motorcycle. Few hours later, he died at the SCB Medical College and Hospital.Mihir had been hurrying home because he had to take his ailing mother to the doctor. His home now has a paralysed father, a severely ill mother and his sister. "I lost my only brother because the roads are full of overloaded vans that make it a nightmare for people travelling. I want no other family to go through the pain that we have gone through, so immediate measures must be taken to stop them from plying through the roads at all times," said Mihir's sister, Monalisa. Overloaded trolleys, mini-trucks and tempos have been posing a degree of threat that experts feel could escalate to more accidents if the commissionerate police does not act upon it immediately."Hand-driven vans and trucks overloaded with bamboos, iron rods and other construction materials traversing through the crowded roads of Cuttack is a common sight. Accidents due to such overloaded vehicles could be quite common but there are hardly any restrictions on them," said social worker Abhimanyu Das A lawyer of the Orissa high court, Kanhayalal Sharma , said Rule 34 (4) of the Bhubaneswar-Cuttack Police Commissionerate (Traffic and Public order) regulations, 2008, clearly says that no goods vehicle or hand-driven trolley shall carry any timber, scaffold poles, ladders, bars or other unwieldy articles larger than the length of its trolley through roads and streets. "They should only ply during timings and on routes decided upon by the commissionerate police," said Sharma, adding that such rules are hardly followed here.However, traffic police have claimed that restrictions are being imposed such overloaded vehicles. "We conduct regular patrolling and check the movement of overloaded vehicles within the city. However, we will now intensify our drive against the hand-driven trolleys also," said assistant commissioner of police(traffic), P K Dalei.

Stay updated with all the Latest Cuttack headlines here. For more exclusive & live news updates from all around India, stay connected with NYOOOZ.