KARAK: Thirteen persons were burnt alive and six others sustained critical injuries when a passenger coach coming from Peshawar to Dera Ismail Khan caught fire after a head-on collision with a pickup truck on the Indus Highway near Tabbikhwa here on Wednesday.

Police said the coach with 17 passengers aboard was instantly engulfed by flames after the collision, giving no time to inmates to get out of the vehicle.

As a result, 13 passengers were burnt alive, while four others sustained critical burns. Two people travelling in the other vehicle were also critically injured.

The locals rushed to the spot and started efforts to rescue the passengers from the burning vehicle. However, they were able to rescue only four passengers from the raging fire. The others were burnt to death, the police said.

The locals said the fire was intense and they faced hardship in extinguishing it. They said the bodies were beyond recognition.

The injured passengers and the charred bodies were shifted to the district headquarters hospital, Karak.

Later, the bodies were dispatched to their native districts for burial.

Meanwhile, the locals blocked the Indus Highway for some time to protest late arrival of the fire brigade vehicle to the spot.

Meanwhile, a man and his wife suffered serious burns when a room in their house caught fire due to gas leak in Ganderi area on Wednesday.

Police said the room filled with gas from a leaking line burst into flames as the house owner, Aamir, attempted to plug in his mobile charger in the electricity board. As a result, Aamir and his wife suffered serious burns.

Local people rescued them from the fire and shifted them to tehsil headquarters hospital, Takht-i-Nusrati, where the doctors referred them to Peshawar in precarious condition.

Published in Dawn, February 7th, 2019