By IANS,
Kolkata : At least 23 people were killed and 55 injured Wednesday in separate accidents in West Bengal, Tamil Nadu and Uttar Pradesh, the police said.
At least 13 people were killed and 20 injured Wednesday when a lorry loaded with sand rammed into a stalled tourist bus on a highway in West Bengal’s Hooghly district.
The accident took place in the early hours of Wednesday on the Durgapur Expressway near Chanditata, about 50 km from here.
“Thirteen people, including the driver of the bus, were killed and over 20 injured, some of them critically, in the road mishap,” said Hooghly district police superintendent Rajiv Mishra.
“The driver had to stop the bus on the way because of an engine problem. When the driver and the helper were repairing the vehicle, a lorry hit the bus,” Mishra told IANS.
The injured passengers of the bus – on its way from Deoghar in Jharkhand to Kolkata – were taken to nearby hospitals and some were moved to Kolkata after daylight.
In Tamil Nadu, ten people were killed Wednesday in two separate road accidents, the police said.
A head-on collision between two trucks in Ambur in Vellore district, 200 km southwest of Chennai, killed seven labourers travelling in one of the trucks.
In another accident, in Hosur town, three people, including a woman, riding a two-wheeler were killed when it dashed against a light commercial vehicle, police said.
Over 10 people were injured in the two incidents and have been admitted to nearby hospitals.
In another accident, at least 25 people were injured Wednesday when two buses collided in Sultanpur district in Uttar Pradesh, the police said.
The condition of both the bus drivers and three passengers was critical, police officer Parshuram Singh told IANS. The injured were moved to a district hospital. The accident took place at Saifulla town, about 140 km from Lucknow.