Thirty-three people were killed and 28 others injured in two separate road accidents in the last 24 hours. In the first incident, at least 28 passengers were killed when a bus carrying a marriage party plunged into a pond on Monday night that turned a wedding celebration into a tragedy.
The mishap took place in Nalbari district when a bus carrying a marriage party fell into a 40-foot deep pond in Kamrup (rural) district after the wooden bridge collapsed.
Among the killed were the bridegroom Naba Kumar Sarma, his parents and friends. Three children were also among the victims, the police said, adding it was not clear as to how many passengers were travelling in the bus.
Local people rushed to incident site and fished out at least six inmates trapped in the bus drowned inside deep water. They have been shifted to hospital for treatment. However, due to non-availability of rescue equipment in the area, many others could not be rescued, said the locals who accused off delayed response from the district authorities. The National Disaster Rescue Force said that they could not start rescue operations at night due to non-availability of night vision equipment. The rescue team, which pulled out the bus from the pond, fished out 28 bodies from the pond.
The locals were also upset about the poor maintenance of the bridge, which had no side railings. Coming down heavily on the PWD authorities for not repairing the bridge, they said that a similar accident had occurred on the bridge five years ago in which 12 people were killed. The government has announced a compensation of `1 lakh to the next of the kin of the dead and `50,000 to those injured.
The second accident took place at Badulipara in Golaghat district when an oil tanker skidded off the road and patrol started spilling from the tank. Soon some locals gathered at the spot to collect fuel. When they were taking out the oil, an overhead wire fell on the tanker, which burst into flames. Twenty-two injured have been admitted to various hospitals in the district.