MUZAFFARABAD: Three persons were killed and one was injured as huge boulders fell from a roadside mountain on a car in Dhirkot area of Azad Jammu and Kashmir on Wednesday, as heavy rains continued to lash the region for the third consecutive day, triggering landslides and cutting off many rural area from the main towns.

Police official Mohammad Hafeez told Dawn that a Suzuki car with four persons on board including the one at the wheels was on its way to Dhirkot amid heavy downpour when huge boulders and mass of earth struck it near a place called Mukhyala.

The man at the wheels, identified as Rashid Iqbal, a patwari, survived miraculously as one of the big boulders that crushed the car stopped hardly few inches before his head, but the remaining three were buried alive beneath the boulders and earth.

The lone survivor with multiple injuries was pulled out of the wreckage beneath and shifted to a nearby hospital, where his condition was out of danger, official Hafeez said.

The bodies of remaining three persons were recovered after three hours with the help of an earth removing machine, he added.

He identified the deceased as police head constable Shiraz Ahmed, forest department official Raja Farman Ali and one Abrar Ahmed.

Saeed Qureshi, a senior director at State Disaster Management Authority told Dawn that rains had triggered landslides at a main artery, linking Muzaffarabad with Hazara division, and several inter district and link roads, suspending movement of traffic.

However, he said, earth removing mavens had been deployed almost everywhere to remove the obstacles.

Mr Qureshi asked people to avoid unnecessary travels until the ongoing spell of heavy rains stopped.

Published in Dawn, March 25th, 2021