Muzaffarpur: Four persons of a family died of asphyxiation inside a newly-constructed septic tank at a village in Bihar's Muzaffarpur district on Tuesday, an official said.

The incident occurred at Madhuban Kanti village under Bara Bharti panchayat of Minapur block this morning when a man, who went to remove the scaffolding of the newly-built septic tank, fell into it accidentally, Sub-Divisional Magistrate (East) Kundan Kumar said.

He died of suffocation after inhaling toxic gas, Kumar said. Another three persons of the family, who rushed to save the first one, entered the tank and also died of asphyxiation, he said.

The deceased were identified as Madhusudan Sahni, Kaushal Kumar, Dharmendra Sahni and Veer Kumar Sahni, he said adding that all of them could be in the age-group of 30-35.

The bodies were sent to Sri Krishna Medical College and Hospital here for post-mortem.

Minapur Circle Officer Gyan Prasad Srivastava annouced that an ex-gratia of Rs 4 lakh would be paid to the next of kin of those died in the incident.

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Kathmandu (PTI): Nepalese citizens on Thursday morning started to reach polling booths in all 165 constituencies amid tight security to cast their vote in the crucial general election, the first since a violent Gen Z protest that toppled the K P Sharma Oli-led government last year.

More than 18.9 million eligible Nepalese will be exercising their franchise to elect the 275-member House of Representatives from among the 3,406 candidates vying for 165 seats under direct voting, and 3,135 candidates vying for 110 seats through proportionate voting.

The voting started at 7 am and will conclude at 5 pm. The counting will start immediately after the ballot boxes are collected.

"Voting started in all the constituencies, including the southern plains, hilly area and the mountain region at 7 am," Election Commission spokesperson Narayan Prasad Bhattarai said.

“The election started in a peaceful environment across the country,” he added.

Addressing a press meet here on the eve of the polls, Acting Election Commissioner Ram Prasad Bhandari on Wednesday had said that all preparations for the election had been completed and urged voters to participate actively and enthusiastically in the democratic exercise.

In Kathmandu, the weather was fine, sky was clear and people were enthusiastically queuing up to cast their votes.

The Gen Z youth, through their two-day intensified protests on September 8 and 9, ousted Prime Minister Oli, chair of the Communist Party of Nepal (Unified Marxist–Leninist) -- CPN-UML -- who was heading a coalition government with the backing of Nepali Congress that enjoyed nearly two-thirds majority support.

After Oli's ouster, President Ramchandra Paudel dissolved the House of Representatives on September 12 and appointed Sushila Karki as the caretaker PM.

The major issues raised by Gen Z are anti-corruption, good governance, an end to nepotism, generational change in political leadership, etc.

Starting Wednesday, Nepal has declared a three-day holiday for the polls.

There are a total of 10,967 polling booths and 23,112 polling centres, the Election Commission data showed. As many as 65 political parties are taking part in the election.