Seven Dera Sacha Sauda followers were killed and 35 injured in a head-on collision between their mini-truck and a tractor-trolley laden with cotton near Sirsa, police said on Wednesday.
All the sect followers were returning to Muktsar in Punjab after attending a religious congregation
in Sirsa, the headquarters of the Dera, when the accident took place near village Chormar, 35-km from Sirsa, on Tuesday night.
The injured were admitted to hospital, the police said adding the dead were identified as Baldev, Jarnail Singh, Tarsem, Amarjit Kaur, Palwinder Kaur, Harminder Kaur and Jaswinder Kaur, the last two teenagers.
A case had been registered against the tractor driver who who fled from the scene after the accident.
The bodies had been handed over to the bereaved families after autopsy at Dabwali Civil Hospital, the police said.