Four burnt alive in head-on collision of two trucks

Four people were Friday charred to death in a fire that engulfed two trucks after a head-on collision near Mahajan village of Rajasthan’s Bikaner district, police said.

The accident took place on the Bikaner- Shriganganagar national highway. One of the trucks, carrying vegetables from Punjab, was heading towards Bikaner while the other, laden with sand, was going towards Sriganganagar when the incident occurred.

According to SHO (Mahajan) Vijendra Kumar, following the collision, both the trucks caught fire. Such was the impact that the vehicles were mangled and the driver and the cleaner of the respective vehicles were trapped inside. Before help could reach them, the four were burnt alive.

Two of the deceased were identified as Indraj and Pragat Singh, the officer said, adding that the other two could not be identified.

Bikaner SP Sawaisingh Godara said that the reason behind the accident was not clear. “It is not clear which vehicle violated traffic rules leading to accident. Both the vehicles were later removed from the highway to resume the traffic, which remained disrupted for over an hour,” he said.