Amritsar : At least 61 people were killed and 72 injured when a crowd of Dussehra revellers that had spilled onto railway tracks while watching burning of Ravana effigy was run over by a train near Amritsar last night.
According to some officials, the accident was triggered by a stampede when a section of the crowd moved towards the track to avoid exploding crackers from the effigy. Just during that moment, two trains arrived from the opposite direction, giving little time to people to escape. One of the trains crashed through the crowd, killing 61 and injuring a lot more.
The diesel multiple unit train was coming from Hoshiarpur as scheduled around 7 pm. According to eyewitnesses, the event normally happened earlier but this time it was delayed as the chief guest, former local MLA and wife of Punjab minister Navjot Singh Sidhu, Navjot Kaur Sidhu, arrived late.
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