Truck driver involved in Karnataka minister Lakshmi Hebbalkar’s car accident arrested after 3 months

The Karnataka Police have arrested the truck driver who was involved in the car accident in January near Belagavi where Minister for Women and Child Development Lakshmi Hebbalkar sustained injuries. Belagavi Superintendent of Police Bhimashankar Guled on Wednesday announced the arrest of the accused, a Maharashtra native. The accused has been identified as Madhukar Kondiram Somavamsha, 65, a native of Takrarwadi village in Indapur taluk, Pune district, the officer added. According to the police, the incident occurred near Ambadgatti on the Pune-Bengaluru national highway when Hebbalkar was on her way to Belagavi in her official vehicle after attending a late-night Congress Legislative Party (CLP) meeting in Bengaluru on January 14. The police said that the truck driven by Somavamsha, which was moving ahead of the minister’s vehicle, veered towards the right without any signal, and the minister’s vehicle crashed into the truck. It is learnt that the truck driver allegedly swerved to avoid a dog on the road. After the accident, the police said Somavamsha had fled the scene with the truck. The minister suffered minor injuries to her face and waist while her brother Chennaraj Hattiholi, a Member of the Legislative Council, who was also in the car, sustained head injuries after their vehicle lost control and crashed into a roadside tree around 6 am, the police said. The police had collected the evidence from the accident spot and sent the samples for forensic analysis.