Palakkad: Amid the protests over the death of four schoolgirls in a truck accident at Panayambadam in Karimba here, Transport Minister KB Ganesh Kumar on Saturday visited the accident spot. After taking a drive through the Palakkad-Kozhikode National Highway in Panayambadam, the minister said that unscientific construction of the road would have led to the accident. He also visited the protesting people and assured immediate action to solve their concerns.

He told the media that dividers would be installed in the accident-prone area and the autorickshaw stand at the junction would be shifted to the left of the road.

“ Due to the flaws in the road construction, drivers would have the tendency to keep the centre of the road while driving through the steep narrow road. I think the truck carrying cement to Kozhikode collided with the truck from Palakkad due to this problem. Hence, we have decided to install dividers on this stretch of the road,” said the minister.

The government has also decided to summon a high-level meeting on Tuesday to discuss the issues related to the Palakkad-Kozhikode National Highway as well as the complaints of the public. Officials of the National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) will also attend the meeting. The minister added that a decision on giving compensation to the families of the children would be taken after holding talks with the Chief Minister.

Responding to the people's criticism against the government's plan to study the issues of the road, the minister declared that he decided to call off the studies and the next step is immediate action to fix the issues.

“ Government will bear the expenditure if NHAI refuses to instal necessary arrangments to fix the problems in Panayambadam road stretch,” he promised the people.

Four class 8 girls of Karimba Government Higher Secondary School were killed after a cement-laden truck lost control and fell on them. The accident took place on Thursday evening when the cement-laden truck collided with another truck from the opposite direction. Following this, Panayambadam in Karimba witnessed a massive protest as the natives laid a siege on the road blocking the traffic. They declared that they would not leave the road until the government takes action to reduce road accidents in the NH stretch of Panayambadam. After blocking the road for nearly two hours, they called off the protest as the officials promised them immediate action to address their concerns. Meanwhile, drivers of both trucks were remanded to 14-day judicial custody.