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INDIA-ACCIDENT,NEWSERIES
39 dead as Indian bus veers off road into canal
NEW DELHI, Feb 16, 2021 (BSS/AFP) – Thirty-nine people were killed Tuesday
when a bus plunged into a deep canal in the central Indian state of Madhya
Pradesh, officials said, with seven others managing to swim to safety.
The accident happened when the bus, which was carrying more than 50
passengers, veered off a bridge and crashed into the 30-feet (9.1-metre) deep
canal in Sidhi district early on Tuesday morning.
It was unclear what caused the bus to swerve, but India’s vast network of
roads is poorly maintained and notoriously dangerous.
Local media reported the bus was completely submerged, and images showed
officials in orange life jackets using rescue boats to look for survivors.
Officials said the driver and six others swam to safety. Several other
people remain missing.
“The death toll in the bus accident has risen to 39,” district magistrate
Ravindra Kumar Choudhary told reporters.
Sixteen women and a child, whose age was not released, were among the dead.
Some of the men who died were on their way to an employment exam for a job at
Indian Railways.
The state government has ordered an inquiry.
An initial investigation suggested the driver lost control of the privately
owned bus, reports said. The vehicle then hit the boundary of the bridge
before crashing into the water.
Local officials stopped the release of water into the canal, which sped up
rescue operations by divers and allowed cranes to pull the blue bus out.
– Treacherous roads –
The Times of India newspaper quoted sources saying it took three hours to
lift the vehicle out. Images showed bodies lined up on the banks of the canal
as distraught relatives hugged each other and cried.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s office tweeted that the families of those
killed in the “horrific” accident would receive 200,000 rupees ($2,750) in
compensation.
“The entire state is standing with those affected,” Madhya Pradesh chief
minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan said in a video message. High-speed vehicles
jostling with motorbikes, pedestrians and cyclists combine with poor
infrastructure and poorly maintained vehicles to make India’s roads
treacherous.
In 2019 more than 150,000 people died — 410 every day or 17 an hour — in
almost half a million accidents, according to the government.
The United States sees nearly five times more accidents than India every
year but the number of deaths in India is four times higher, according to the
Times of India.
The main causes are excessive speed, not wearing helmets — sales of two-
wheelers far outstrip those of cars — and not using seatbelts.
Earlier this month, Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari inaugurated Road
Safety Month, saying that the government aimed to halve road deaths and
accidents by 2025.
In the same month an out-of-control dumper truck crushed 15 people to death
as they slept by the roadside in the western state of Gujarat.
The dead included a baby girl, eight women and six men. The truck collided
with a tractor carrying sugarcane just after midnight at a crossroads.
BSS/AFP/ARS/1938 hrs