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Tezpur/Guwahati, March 2: Passengers travelling in a Siliguri-Silapathar bus had a close shave today when the vehicle fell into a river near Gohpur in Sonitpur district of Assam.
Officer-in-charge of Gohpur police station Dilip Bania said the bus (WB73B1291), which was travelling to Silapathar on National Highway 52, was on the approach road to the bridge on the Sulengi when it fell from 10 feet into the river around 1.30pm. “There is very little water in the river,” he added.
Bania said the bridge is higher than the approach road, making navigation difficult. As a result, the driver may have lost control.
He said it was not known how many people had boarded the bus from Siliguri but 30 passengers were found injured.
Police sources said all the passengers were safe and barring six who had received serious injuries, most of them had been shifted to Gohpur civil hospital. Many of them have also left for their respective destinations.
Gohpur sub-divisional medical and health officer Abani Roy told this correspondent that the six seriously injured persons had been shifted to a missionary hospital at Borjan, 35km from Gohpur. All of them are stable.
Ayasha Khatun, 40, suffered head and wrist injuries while her husband Abdul Aziz, 60, hurt his ear. Both are from Harmati in North Lakhimpur. Sunita Purti, 30, also from North Lakhimpur, received head injuries.
Sanjoy Singh, 35, from Gopalganj in Jharkhand hurt his chest while Ananda Toppo, 30, from Chattisgarh, suffered head injuries.
Gopal Das, who fractured his arm, was referred to the GMCH but moved to Dhemaji of his own accord.
“All the remaining persons suffered minor injuries. There was nobody from Bengal,” Roy said, adding that those admitted to the civil hospital had been discharged.
Bania said of the two drivers and a handyman in the bus, one driver was in Gohpur while the other driver and the handyman were absconding.
The incident site is 350km from Tezpur, the headquarters of Sonitpur district, and 530km from Guwahati.
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