It didn’t turn out to be the usual laidback Sunday morning. I woke up with a message about Shiv Sangram Party president and former MLC, Vinayak Mete’s accidental death on the Pune-Mumbai Expressway. The news was shocking. My mind was jammed with the memories of such tragedies, some of which happened with people I had been familiar with. Mete was one of them. His death took me back by 13 years when a family of eight, including small children, that stayed in our housing society in Thane died instantly in a road accident near E-way. With their relatives up north, we, the residents of the society, took it upon ourselves to perform the family’s last rites. It was Diwali. We ceased celebrations. The darkness replaced the lamps’ shine. One of the kids and his uncle survived the mishap. The survivors are still in touch with all of us.

Mete’s family and his followers are in deep pain and agitated. They have asked questions over road safety, delay in emergency aid, and raised demands to ensure that accidents are prevented. Strong reactions have come criticising the drawbacks that invite such accidents and cause deaths. Mumbai-Pune Expressway, ever since it was opened for traffic over 20 years ago, has been seeing the worst. Hundreds of unknown faces have perished so far. The victims include celebrities from various walks of life. Mete’s death has dug up the fault lines yet again.