Six pilgrims, including a woman and a minor girl, were killed and 20 injured when a truck rammed into a minibus on National Highway-44 in Haryana’s Ambala in the early hours of Friday. The police noted that the driver of the truck is presently on the run.
The passengers of the minibus were mostly relatives, who hailed from Uttar Pradesh’s Bulandshahr and were on their way to the Mata Vaishno Devi shrine in Jammu. “The truck was moving in an erratic pattern near a petrol pump on the NH-44 around 1:30 a.m., and swerved sharply to the right while the minibus tried to overtake it. The vehicle was hit in the process and the minibus overturned trapping the passengers under it. Six of them died on the spot,” complainant Rajender Singh, 49, said in the FIR.
Mr. Singh, one of the passengers, is a labourer belonging to Bulandshahr’s Sikandarabad area. He said that he was going for a pilgrimage with his family and relatives.
The deceased have been identified as his brother-in-law Vinod, cousin Satbir, brother Manoj, sister-in-law Guddi, father-in-law Mehar Chand, and granddaughter Deepti.
Some passers-by took the injured to Adesh Hospital and the Amabala Civil Hospital.
The police said the injured were under treatment, and that some of the were in a serious condition.
A case has been registered on charges of culpable homicide not amounting to murder and for rash driving under the Indian Penal Code at Parao Ambala Cantonment Police Station.
