SUKKUR: Two women and two young girls were killed and 45 other persons were injured when the roof of a house collapse on participants in a religious procession outside the central Imambargah in Babarloi town of Khairpur district on Sunday.

Police and local residents said that a large number of people were present outside the Imambargah to take out a mourning procession when the roof of a nearby house collapsed and many of them were hit by the falling debris. A stampede followed and more people were injured, they said.

An emergency was declared at the Sukkur and Khairpur civil hospitals immediately after the incident. About 25 injured victims were taken to the Sukkur Civil Hospital, where doctors pronounced Zoya Solangi, 7, daughter of Nasrullah Solangi, and Kaki Solangi, 22, daughter of Gul Mohammed Solangi, dead. The bodies were sent to Begma Jee village near Kandhra town for burial.

An eight-year-old girl, Hina, daughter of Pervez Solangi, was taken to the Hira Medical Centre, where she succumbed to her grave injuries. Her body was sent to Kot Mir Mohammed village in Khairpur district.

The bodies of three other victims, Zoya, 22, Bakhtawar, 23, and an aged woman, whose identity could not be known, were taken away by their relatives from the site of the incident.

About 10 persons, most of them women and children, were admitted to the Sukkur Civil Hospital for treatment.

Another 10 women and children were provided emergency treatment at the Hira Medical Centre. One of them, Irfana Dayo, told the media she along with some other people was standing on the rooftop of the house when its roof collapsed all of a sudden.

Meanwhile, leader of a Shia organisation, Syed Nasir Hussain Shah has claimed that five mourners were killed and over 50 others injured in the incident.

Published in Dawn, November 9th, 2015

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