7 of a wedding party killed in bus accident

MANGALURU/KASARAGOD: Seven people were killed after a bus ferrying wedding guests from Puttur veered off a steep road and fell over an empty house at Pariyaram, a border village near Panathur in Kasaragod district on Sunday. The accident took place 5km away from the groom’s house at Karike in Kodagu district.

All the deceased belonged to Puttur in Dakshina Kannada. Kasaragod district administration identified them as Sreyas (13), Ravichandran (40) and his wife Seshamma (39), Sumathi (50), Aadarsh (12), a deaf and mute boy and his father Rajesh (45), and the cleaner of the bus Sasidhara Poojary (43).

The private bus was carrying around 65 people, including 14 children. Of them, 11 people suffered serious injuries and 46 survived with minor wounds, said district surveillance officer Dr A T Manoj. The passengers with serious injuries were first taken to a hospital in Poodankal, 17 km away from Kasargod, and later were shifted to Kanhangad District Hospital. Later, the 11 patients were shifted to private hospitals in Mangaluru in ambulances.

Those with minor injuries were bused to Wenlock District Hospital in Mangaluru, from where the Dakshina Kannada district administration dropped them back to Puttur. Aruna, a BEd graduate from Puttur, and Prashanth Kumar, an employee of Karike panchayat’s water division, were getting married on Sunday.

In the morning, some rituals were conducted at Aruna’s house in Puttur and a few among the remaining ones were scheduled to be held at Kumar’s house in Karike in the afternoon. Around 10.30 am, two buses ferrying the guests left for Karike. The bride and the groom left in private cars. The accident took place around 12.30 pm at Pariyaram near Panathur, which was 5km from Kumar’s house in Karike panchayat.