Pune: At least 12 hurt as car rams into crowd

Initial investigations reportedly indicate the driver was drunk.

Mumbai: At least a dozen persons, including students, were injured after a car into rammed them near a tea stall in the Sadashiv Peth area in the heart of Pune city on Saturday evening.

Among the 12 injured were seven students preparing for Maharashtra Public Service Commission (MPSC) examinations.

The injured were admitted to the Sancheti Hospital and Modak Hospital.

The driver, Jairam Mule (27), a resident of Bibwewadi, has been placed under arrest.

After the incident, BJP MLA Hemant Rasane, who represents the Kasba Peth constituency, spoke to Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis.

Fadnavis and Deputy Chief Ministers Eknath Shinde and Ajit Pawar, who is the guardian minister of Pune district, reviewed the situation.

He requested the CM to give some sort of a relief for the examinations scheduled for Sunday.

“Initial investigations indicate that the driver may have been under the influence of alcohol at the time of the incident," Deputy Commissioner of Police (Zone 1) Nikhil Pingale said.

Pune-based social and RTI activist Vijay Kumbhar said: “Drunk, reckless Jayram Mule (27) savagely plowed through 13 MPSC students in Pune's Sadashiv Peth, brutally dragging tea stall victims in a nightmarish crash. Unlicensed, clueless, and plastered after his birthday, he wrecked lives. 3 critically hurt. Cops nabbed the fool, drunk confirmed.”

Eyewitnesses reported that several of the injured suffered leg fractures.

“A few students appearing for the MPSC exams were gathered around a tea stall near Bhave School when the car hit them,” Senior Police Inspector Vijaymala Pawar of Vishrambag police station said.

Earlier in May 2025, a speeding Mercedes crashed into a motorcycle rider, claiming his life. The incident took place on the Wadgaon Bridge stretch of the Pune–Bengaluru highway. Police said all four people in the car, including the driver, were intoxicated at the time of the accident.

A year ago, on 19 May, 2024 around 0230 hrs, a 17-year-old minor boy - after visiting two pubs - Cosie and Blak pubs - in the upscale Koregaon Park area, drove the high-end Porsche Taycan at a speed of over 200 kmph and hit a motorcycle along the Landmark Society on Kalyani Nagar-Airport Road in Pune, killing Aneesh Awadhiya and Ashwini Koshta, IT engineers in Johnson Controls.