Six people of a family, including two children, died on the spot in a head-on collision between an oil tanker and their car on National Highway-4 near Mudigere Cross in Mulbagal taluk of Kolar district on Saturday. The deceased have been identified as Putta Venkateshaiah (73), Pushpaleela (68), Putta Aravind Kumar (38), Reena Putta Aravind (35), Nisha (11) and Nitish (7), all residents of Bengaluru.
The family hailed from Hindupur in Andhra Pradesh and had moved to the city 12 years ago and the family was staying at Kumara Swamy Layout Vth Main in city. Aravind and his wife were to celebrate their wedding anniversary on Sunday and the family was headed to Tirupati when the tanker, coming from the opposite direction, hit the speeding car while trying to overtake another vehicle around 8.15 am. Police, with the help of locals, extricated the bodies from the mangled vehicle. Nagali police registered a case.
The family had left for Tirupati around 5.30 am in a Maruti Swift car. They had a brief halt at the Andhra Pradesh border for breakfast. The Kolar police called up Aravind’s brother-in-law Srinivas at 10:30 am and informed about the accident. The bodies were brought to Wilson Garden crematorium at 6 pm.
The youngest of Putta Venkateshaiah’s three children, Aravind owned an interior design firm — Indian Institute of Design — on Kanakapura Main Road. He was the managing director while his wife was the director. He has worked for many IT giants before starting his own firm two year ago.
Aravind was married 14 years ago. Of their two children, Nisha was studying in 5th standard while Nitish was a 3rd standard student at Aurobindo School in Banashankari II Stage. Putta Venkateshaiah was a businessman and worked with the transport company Prakash Roadlines at Hindupur.
His eldest son is Putta Prakash, and daughter Lakshmi is married to Srinivas.