Nine killed, around 40 injured as private bus falls into 500-feet deep gorge in Himachal's Sirmaur
Nahan (HP) (PTI): Nine people died while about 40 others were injured after a private bus fell into a 500-feet deep gorge in Himachal Pradesh’s Sirmaur district on Friday afternoon, police said.
The accident occurred when the bus en route from Shimla to Kupvi via Rajgarh veered off the road and plunged into the gorge down the road and landed upside down near Haripurdhar village, around 95 kilometres from the district headquarters, Nahan.
Sub-divisional Magistrate (SDM) Sangrah, Sunil Kayath, who is at the spot supervising the rescue operation, told PTI that nine bus passengers have died while about 40 are injured.
He said the rescue operation is going on war footing and all the injured and dead were being rushed to nearby Sangrah and Dadahu hospitals.
Expressing grief over the loss of lives in the accident, Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu, in a statement issued here, directed the district authorities to provide all possible assistance to the next of kin of those killed in the accident and ensure the best medical care to the injured.
Industry Minister and local MLA from the Shallai assembly segment, Harshwardhan Chauhan, said the district administration has been put on alert, and medical teams and doctors at Dadahu, Sangrah and Nahan hospital are prepared for emergency.
He said the cause of the accident is yet to be ascertained and expressed condolences on the incident.
Locals on the spot suspect that the bus driver might have lost control of the vehicle, following which it skidded off the road due to frost accumulation.
In videos circulating on social media, a large crowd is seen helping in the rescue operations, trying to get the injured out of the wreckage of the bus.
Locals rushed for rescue and informed the police after the accident. Officials of the district administration, police and others are also at work.
Balbir Chauhan, a resident of Haripurdhar and member of the BJP state working committee, said that the locals have done remarkable work in rescuing the passengers from the deep gorge in the difficult conditions.
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MP: Woman, lover conspire to get husband killed; police looking for contract killer
Dhar (MP) (PTI): A 25-year-old woman and her lover have been arrested in the district for allegedly conspiring to kill her husband by hiring a contract killer, police said on Thursday.
The case was solved within 36 hours of the murder though the woman initially tried to mislead the police by claiming that robbers killed her husband, an official said.
Dev Krishna Purohit (28) was stabbed to death on the intervening night of Monday and Tuesday at his house in Gondikheda Charan village, about 60 km from here.
Superintendent of Police Mayank Awasthi told reporters that accused Priyanka Purohit (25) was married to Dev Krishna when she was around 15 years old. Priyanka moved to her matrimonial home after attaining adulthood but was unwilling to live with her husband, leading to frequent disputes between them.
During investigation, it emerged that she was in a relationship with Kamlesh (32), the SP said.
The duo allegedly hatched a plan to kill Dev Krishna and hired a man identified as Surendra for Rs 1 lakh do the job, he said
After Dev Krishna was killed, Priyanka told police that unidentified persons broke into the house, attacked her husband with a sharp weapon while holding her captive in another room, and fled with valuables.
But the inconsistencies in her statements raised suspicion, and eventually she confessed to hatching the murder conspiracy, the SP said.
While she and Kamlesh were arrested, police are looking for the contract killer, the official added.
