35 killed as bus falls into river

Thirty-five passengers were killed and 13 others injured, some of them seriously, when a bus rolled down into Neeru river in Doda district on Wednesday.

The bus skidded off the road and rolled down into the river at Nalti-Galgandhar at 0815 hours, police said.  Soon after the accident, rescue teams rushed to the
scene and extricated the bodies.

While 33 bodies were recovered from the place of mishap, two died in a hospital in Jammu, they said adding six other injured were hospitalised in Doda. Nine of the 13 injured have been airlifted to Government Medical College (GMC) hospital here.

Jammu and Kashmir chief minister Omar Abdullah expressed grief over the accident and asked authorities to provide best medicare facilities to the injured. PDP chief Mehbooba Mufti and former chief minister Mufti sayeed also expressed grief over the accident. The accident also figured in the state assembly with MLA Inderwal G M Saroori demanding adequate measures to check rising number of such accidents in Doda and Kishtwar districts.