5 killed in car-bus collision on Yamuna Expressway in Mathura

Mathura: Five young men were charred to death in a collision between a private sleeper bus and car at Yamuna Expressway in Mathura on Monday morning.

The collision between the private bus and the Maruti Swift car occurred around 7:45 am when the bus went out of control after one of its tyres burst.

The incident took place near the 117th milestone under Mahavan police station of Mathura. Both the vehicles were moving from Agra to Noida.

The car, coming from behind, rammed into the bus and both vehicles caught fire. “The occupants of the bus managed to escape, but those in the car could not and all five were charred to death” said SSP Mathura, Shailesh Kumar Pandey. According to police officials, the deceased have been identified as Anshuman Yadav (27), a native of Shikohabad area in Firozabad district of Agra. He worked at a private telecom company in Delhi and was driving the car when the incident took place, said cops.

The other occupants of the car included Himanshu Yadav (26), Shiv Kishan (30), Sarvar Hussain (32) and Zayed Khan (24), all from Firozabad and were going to Delhi. Anshuman was married just one and half years ago while Himanshu’s wedding was scheduled for the next month. “The dead bodies were sent for post-mortem and their families were informed. A probe has been ordered and FIR will be registered into the incident based on family’s complaint” added SSP Pandey.

Eyewitnesses said that the bus suddenly took a turn while running and a speeding car from behind collided into it. “There were around 35-40 passengers including foreign tourists in the bus who were going to Delhi. We felt the jolt and saw that a car had crashed into the bus. In just a few seconds, it caught fire and the flames spread into the bus. Both the vehicles got completely engulfed in the fire. However, all the passengers in the bus managed to escape without injuries,” said Rahat (24), a tourist from Bangladesh.

Meanwhile, the passengers in the bus alleged that even after nearly an hour of calling for fire brigades, the help was delayed. By the time flames were doused, the victims in car were completely burnt. Following the incident, the entire lane of the expressway was blocked for nearly two hours as police had to stop traffic moving from Agra to Noida.