Kanpur accident: Pall of gloom descends on Kortha village

KANPUR: A pall of gloom descended on Kortha village, when dead bodies of 26 villagers, who were killed in a road accident on the highway in Ghatampur area of Kanpur on Saturday night, arrived from the postmortem house in the early hours of Sunday.
Twenty six people, mostly women and children had died and several others sustained critical injuries when a recklessly driven tractor-trolley carrying around 35 to 40 people fell into a roadside pond on the highway in between Saadh and Gambhirpur of Ghatampur.
The bodies were dispatched in ambulances amidst heavy police presence from the mortuary.
As the bodies reached the village, the grief-stricken family members of the victims could not control their emotions and were seen wailing and crying inconsolably.
What was even more tragic was that a villager -Siyaram lost six members of his family including his wife, two daughters-in-law, two granddaughters and a grandson in the mishap.
Among those who came to pay tributes were locals, politicians and officials of the district administration.
Union minister Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti, who reached the village to console the family, but she too could not control her emotions and broke down and wept bitterly.
Locals thronged the mishap site, village and later to Dyodhi Ghat to see the mass funeral.
The district administration has requested the families of the deceased in the village to perform the last rites together at the Dyodhi Ghat.
After the accident on Saturday night, the post-mortem of 26 bodies was completed by 6am on Sunday.
The last rites of 26 dead bodies will be performed at the Dyodhi Ghat on the banks of the river Ganga in the Maharajpur area of the district.
A heavy police force has been deployed in the Kortha village, and at the Dyodhi Ghat where the funeral rites would be performed.
DM Vishak G Iyer visited the house of each and every deceased and convinced their family members to cremate the dead body at Dyodhi Ghat, to which they gave their consent. At the Dyodhi Ghat, pyres have been prepared for 13 dead bodies, while 13 minor children who died will be given 'bhumasadhi'.