Murshidabad bus accident: Toll goes up to 42; four people still missing

Six more bodies have been pulled out of a bus a day after the vehicle plunged into a canal in Daulatabad area of West Bengal’s Murshidabad district.

With this, the death toll has gone to 42.

Relatives of those missing were seeing at the accident site on Tuesday morning waiting for search operations to resume. However, due to heavy fog, search operations by the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) and Disaster Management Group (DMG) were delayed.

As soon as operations started, six bodies were pulled out within the first two hours and sent to Murshidabad Medical College for postmortem.

Four people, identified as Rafiqul Islam, Abdul Malik, Prodyut Chowdhury and Safina Rahman were still missing.

Earlier, Prime Minister Narendra Modi took to Twitter to express his sorrow regarding the accident.

Anguished by the bus accident in West Bengal’s Murshidabad. My thoughts and prayers are with those who lost their loved ones: PM @narendramodi

— PMO India (@PMOIndia) January 30, 2018

Very sad to learn about the horrific bus accident in Murshidabad, West Bengal. Condolences to the bereaved families and wishing an early recovery to those injured #PresidentKovind

— President of India (@rashtrapatibhvn) January 30, 2018

Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee said there inspection of the bridge would be done. “By midnight on Monday, bodies have been handed over to the family members. Inspection of the bridge should be done and there should be a speed restriction in place,” she said on Tuesday.

Leaders of the Opposition parties alleged that the delay in search operations happened owing to administrative carelessness. State Congress president and party MP Adhir Chowdhury said that had it not been the negligence of the state government some more lives could have been saved. “According to the rules, there should be a disaster management team at all districts. Why wasn’t there any in Murshidabad? Why wasn’t any crane available here and those had to be brought in from Krishnanagar? Area locals had immediately helped in rescue. That was actual help. What the CM did was pure drama,” he said.

Similar was the views of CPI(M) MLA Sujan Chakraborty. “Instead of ferrying the CM, transport minister and other bureaucrats to the place in a helicopter, had the divers been brought in on time, they would have helped in getting more people out of the water,” he said.