Uttarakhand: 5 killed, 3 injured after utility vehicle falls into gorge in Tehri Garhwal District

DEHRADUN

: Five people were killed and three others injured after a pickup vehicle they were travelling in veered off the road and fell into a deep gorge on Ghansali-Ghuttu road in

Tehri Garhwal

district on Thursday.

On receiving information, a team of State Disaster Response Force (SDRF) led by head constable Sanjay Negi reached the spot and launched a relief and rescue operation.

“Five passengers died on the spot, while the remaining three who sustained injuries were brought to the road head from where they were taken to a nearby hospital,” said inspector Lalita Negi of SDRF.

Those dead were identified as Pratap Singh, 44, Laxmi Prasad, 65, Gunanand Singh, 65, Hema Devi, 50, and Bihari Lal, 65, all residents of Saund village in Tehri Garhwal district.

The injured persons included driver Bachan Singh, Vijay Ram and Rajendra Singh, all natives of Saund village.

In a similar accident on the same day, a jeep ferrying local residents crashed near Okhal Kanda Aghod village in a remote area of Nainital district, killing five of the six people in the vehicle, which going from Haldwani towards Ritha Saheb, died. A woman, Hema Devi, and her two sons, Nandan Singh and Rahul Mtiali, were among the dead. The other two were identified as Suresh

Singh Bora

and Basant Raikuni. A team of the SDRF and the district administration rushed to the site for rescue operation. The one injured person is being treated.

Nainital SSP Pankaj Bhatt said, “The accident occurred around 7:30 pm. The vehicle fell into a 200-metre ditch. The driver managed to get out just in time, he is being treated. As the site is a good 120km away from Nainital, we received the information late, but an SDRF was dispatched quickly. We suspect that the bad condition of the road was responsible for the mishap.”

Significantly, almost three dozen people have died in major road accidents in the past 15 days in Uttarakhand. As many as 25 people from Madhya Pradesh lost their lives after a bus full of pilgrims fell into a gorge in

Uttarkashi

district last week.


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