BANIHAL An Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) personnel was killed and 34 others were injured Monday when a bus carrying them skidded off the road and fell into a gorge along the Jammu-Srinagar National Highway, police said.
Five of the injured ITBP personnel are in a critical condition, a police officer said.
The vehicle was part of a Jammu-bound convoy and the accident occurred near Khuni Nallah in Ramban district around 8.45 am, a police officer said.
Trees prevented the bus from falling further down in the gorge, the officer said.
He said an ITBP personnel identified as Mohammad Ali was killed while 34 others, including civilian driver and conductor, were rescued in an injured condition and shifted to district hospital Ramban.
He said the ITBP column was deployed in Budgam district of central Kashmir in connection with the recently held panchayat polls and the personnel were returning to their base outside the state when the accident occurred.
30 Passengers Had Miraculous Escape
Over 30 passengers had a great escape when a bus skidded off a slippery, icy hill road and teetered precariously over a steep gorge in Jammu and Kashmir’s Doda district on Monday, police said. Locals helped rescue the passengers from the bus, which was wedged between two concrete parapets on the winding road. In a scene that could be straight out of a film, half the vehicle was hanging over the gorge at Gatsu village on the Batote-Kishtwar highway in Jammu region, Bhadarwah Additional Superintendent of Police (ASP) Rajinder Singh said.
The bus was on its way to Jammu town from Padder area of Kishtwar district when the accident took place in the morning, Singh said. The driver lost control of the vehicle due to frost on the road in the sub-zero temperatures, the ASP said, citing preliminary investigation reports. The officer advised drivers to manoeuvre carefully as most of the roads in the district remain frozen during winter and become slippery.
In a separate accident in Kathua district, a person named Mohammad Abdullah Sheikh died and five people were injured in a head-on collision between a car and another vehicle near Gund Thather village in Banihal in the morning, a police officer said.
In another incident, Arun Raina was found dead inside his car, which was pulled out from a canal near Sawan Chak. The vehicle apparently fell into the canal on Sunday night and was noticed by some persons who informed the police, the officer said.
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