22 burnt alive in UP bus accident | CM announces ex-gratia

Lucknow: At least 22 persons were charred to death in Uttar Pradesh after their bus caught fire following a massive collision with a truck on a national highway in Bareilly on Monday.

Police officials have said that the death toll could rise as most of the passengers were severely burnt. Fire tenders were rushed to the accident site immediately after the police was informed.

Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath has announced an ex-gratia of Rs 2 lakhs for the kin of deceased people. The Uttar Pradesh government will also provide an aid of Rs 50 thousand to critically injured people and an amount of Rs 25 thousand to other injured ones.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi also condoled the death in the accident and annocued an ex-gratia of Rs 2 lakh each to the kin of dead people.

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The case:

• The accident occurred at around 1430 hours near the inverted University turn when the bus from New Delhi heading towards Gonda, via Bareilly, collided head on with a speeding truck coming from the direction of Lucknow.
• An explosion followed and fire broke out in the bus. A district official said that the truck driver has escaped. The police were looking for him.
• Some injured were rushed to nearby medical facilities. Condition of most of them is stated to be critical.

Senior police officers including Inspector General of Police S.K. Bhagat, Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Jogendra Kumar and other officials are monitoring the rescue and relief operations.

The traffic has been diverted and now efforts were underway to extract the charred remains of the passengers.