Hyderabad bus escapes 20 Maharashtra robbers

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Hyderabad: Teenaged robbers equipped with knives and sticks attacked an AP Tourism Volvo bus going from Shirdi to Hyderabad around midnight on Tuesday at a village in Solapur district of Maharashtra. Thanks to two brave bus drivers, none of the passengers was injured or looted.
Bus driver Muhammed Sardar, 43, said there were around 20 youths in the gang and all of them appeared to be teenagers. Sardar and the other driver P. Srinivas Raju, 30, sustained minor injuries.
“After halting for a while at a dhaba in Ahmednagar, we were moving along the state highway on the Karmala-Solapur route. We were just seven kilometres out of Karmala, when suddenly the bus was pelted with stones. We heard what sounded like a blast near the bus. Thinking that the tyre had burst, my fellow driver and I got down to check it. Suddenly, about 20 youngsters appeared out of the darkness with knives and sticks and began running towards the bus shouting abusive words, and started attacking us,” Sardar recalled.
Bus drivers thwart robbery bid
Some of the miscreants, who on Tuesday midnight attacked an AP Tourism Volvo bus going from Shirdi to Hyderabad, had tried to board the bus to rob the passengers, but were pushed away by the drivers who then got into the bus, closed the door and drove away, one of the drivers Muhammed Sardar said.
The incident took place at around 11 pm. There were 34 passengers in the Volvo bus (Registration No. AP23Y2156). The stone pelting broke a window but there was no other damage.
Passengers complained to the policemen manning a post at the Tembhurni tollgate. “They informed the highway police and told us that the area comes under Karmala police station. Since the police station was too far away from Tembhurni, we continued our journey without filing a police complaint,” the bus driver said.
APTDC’s travel manager Mohammed Ibrahim said that the department will file a complaint with the superintendent of police in Ahmednagar on Thursday.
"This is the first time such an incident has occurred. All passengers are safe, but the drivers sustained minor injuries. We will be lodging a complaint with the SP of Ahmednagar,” he said.