Reports have emerged of overloaded buses plying from Kaduwela to Nawinna via the Outer Circular Highway (OCH).

According to prevailing laws, it is illegal for buses to exceed the number of seats when boarding passengers. However, it is said that this is a common occurrence in this route.

‘Sri Lanka Mirror’ has received video footage of such an overloaded bus that had set off at 11.00am yesterday from Kaduwela.

This bus had initially attempted to enter the OCH from the Kothalawala interchange but was denied passage by police officers on duty, stating that the bus was overloaded. The driver was advised to offload the excess number of passengers before entering the OCH.

Instead, the driver had merely reversed from the interchange entrance and accessed the OCH from the nearby Kaduwela interchange instead, with the same passenger load. Mobile phone footage of the incident captured by a passenger, is as follows :