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Rudraprayag bus accident: One more body recovered, toll now 4, 8 still missing
A bus carrying 20 Char Dham pilgrims veered off the Badrinath National Highway and plunged into the Alaknanda River between Rudraprayag and Gauchar
Dehradun: The body of a 55-year-old man from Rajasthan was recovered on Friday as search operations continued to locate eight others still missing after a bus carrying 20 Char Dham pilgrims veered off the Badrinath National Highway and plunged into the Alaknanda River between Rudraprayag and Gauchar on Thursday morning.
The body of Sanjay Soni, a resident of Udaipur, was recovered from the banks of the river in Ratura, 7 km downstream of the accident site in Gholtir.
“Since morning, the rescue teams have so far recovered one body from the river bank in the Ratura area. The body was brought up to the road and sent to the district hospital in Rudraprayag. His body was then handed over to his family after *panchayatnama* and postmortem,” Rudraprayag superintendent of police (SP) Akshay Prahlad Konde said.
The 31-seater bus, headed to Badrinath, was carrying pilgrims from Rajasthan, Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh, and Maharashtra when the accident took place at 7.50 am.
Three bodies — Vishal Soni (42) from Rajgarh in Madhya Pradesh, Dreamy (17) from Surat in Gujarat, and Gauri Soni (41) from Rajgarh in Madhya Pradesh — were recovered yesterday. Eight passengers who were injured were taken to hospital.
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Konde said that rescuers continue to search for eight missing pilgrims. “A joint rescue operation was started by the national disaster response force (NDRF), state disaster response force (SDRF), district disaster response force (DDRF), police, fire department, and divers of Jal Police. Watchers have been deployed at various points along the river from the accident site to Srinagar (a 45 km stretch of the river). Boats and sonar equipment are assisting the search operation,” he added.
Bus driver Sumit Kumar, who survived the crash, said he wasn’t speeding but lost control of the bus after a head-on collision with a speeding truck. Kumar said the truck hit the bus on his side of the vehicle, “after which I lost control and the bus fell into Alaknanda”.
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Police said the driver’s version of the events was yet to be verified. For now, the priority is to help the victims.
A First Information Report (FIR) was registered under Sections 125 (endangering life or personal safety of others), 106 (causing death by negligence), and 281 (driving a vehicle negligently on a public road) of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS).
