45 charred to death in southern India bus fire

Forty-five people were charred to death when a bus in which they were aboard caught fire in the southern Indian state of Andhra Pradesh on Wednesday, the police said. The mishap happened at Kothakota in the state's Mahbubnagar district, 140 km from state capital Hyderabad, at 5 a.m. (local time) when the speeding private bus, with 50 passengers on board, rammed into a culvert while overtaking another vehicle, and the ensuing collision ignited its fuel tank. "Charred bodies of 45 persons have been retrieved from the bus, " Deputy Inspector General of Police V. Naveen Chand told the media in Hyderabad. The driver of the bus along with four passengers managed to escape the blaze while the others died in their sleep as the inferno engulfed the bus in seconds. The driver has been arrested while at least three injured passengers have been admitted to a local hospital. The owner of the ill-fated bus, S. Ahmed, said the Jabbar Travels' air-conditioned Volvo bus began its journey at 11 p.m. ( local time) on Tuesday from the neighboring state of Karnataka's capital Bengaluru for Hyderabad, and picked up 50 passengers along the way. "Most of the passengers could not escape as the flames caught the plastic and cloth materials, especially the seats, and were charred to death," Ahmed told the media. Local TV channels beamed the footage of the charred bus throughout the day and reported that the passengers on the bus were burnt beyond recognition. In fact, many passengers were young software engineers who were returning home from Bengaluru on the occasion of Diwali, the Hindu festival of lights. "The identification of the deceased will be done after conducting DNA tests and collecting blood samples of the relatives. The mortal remains will be handed over to the kin of the deceased after the DNA tests," Mahabubnagar district's administrative head Girija Shankar said. Transport Minister of the state Botsa Satyanarayana has ordered a probe into the incident. "The total capacity of the bus was 45 but there were 50 passengers on board. We will take action against the bus for overcrowding," he told the media. Road accidents are common in India, claiming over 100,000 lives every year. The mishaps are often caused by poorly maintained vehicles, overloading and reckless driving.