Six killed as tree falls on vehicles near Manikaran Gurdwara in Himachal Pradesh

Representational image. Pic/iStock

Six people, including four tourists, were killed and several injured after a huge tree got uprooted following a storm in Himachal Pradesh's Kullu district and fell on several vehicles near Gurdwara Manikaran Sahib on Sunday, officials said.

Medical teams, police and revenue officials are present at the spot and coordinating the rescue and relief operations, Kullu Sub Divisional Magistrate Vikas Shukla told reporters at the spot. Among those killed were Jammu and Kashmir resident Reena, who was working in Manikaran, Sameer, a native of Nepal working in the BRO office in Manali, and four tourists -- Varsini from Bangalore and Dhinta, Manish and Gulshan -- the students of Haryana School of Regional Marketing, said Tehsildar Hari Singh Yadav.

Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu and Leader of Opposition Jai Ram Thakur have expressed deep grief over the incident. Congress MLA from Kullu Sunder Singh Thakur said six people were killed when a tree opposite the Gurdwara Manikaran Sahib fell on vehicles parked on the road. The injured have been identified as Bangalore resident Ramesh, his wife Pallavi and son Bhargav; Haryana's Prachi and Vikram Aacharya and his wife Tumpa Aacharya, they said. Aacharya, who is from Assam, said the incident occurred around 4:30 when he was waiting for a vehicle along with his family members.

"We had come on Kullu-Manali trip. It was not a landslide and everything happened so quickly that we could not understand what happened," he added. The injured have been shifted to a Kullu hospital and are out of danger, the officials said. The chief minister has directed the district administration to extend all possible assistance to the victims and their families. He has also instructed them to ensure the best possible medical treatment to the injured. Meanwhile, videos of the incident are being shared on social media platforms in which people are heard saying that no help reached the spot in the first hour.

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