Five Manimahesh pilgrims were injured, of which three are critical, when the car they were travelling in skidded off the road and fell into a 70-metre gorge in Chowari subdivision of Himachal Pradesh’s Chamba district, police said on Monday.
The incident took place around 12:45am on the intervening night of Sunday and Monday at Kheda area when the victims were returning after a pilgrimage to Manimahesh lake.
A police team rushed to the spot on receiving a word of the incident and evacuated the injured to a primary health centre nearby from where three of them were referred to Dr Rajendera Prasad Government Medical College, Tanda.
The injured—Om Prakash, Amit Mehra, Ashwani Kumar, Navneet Pathania and Sanjay Kumar— are residents of Hatwas village in Nagrota Bagwan subdivision of Kangra.
A Chamba police official said Pathania, who was behind the wheels, lost control over the vehicle while negotiating a sharp curve.
A case has been registered against him under Sections 279 (rash and negligent driving) and 337 (causing hurt by act endangering life or personal safety of others) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and investigations are on.