People look on as a bus is pulled out of the canal following an accident in the Gobind Sagar reservoir in Himachal Pradesh.
An overcrowded bus plunged off a mountain road into a reservoir yesterday in Himachal Pradesh, killing 23 people, an official said. Authorities and divers searched for more bodies, fearing the death toll could rise as many passengers were riding on the roof of the 40-seat bus when it rolled down into the Gobind Sagar reservoir. “So far 23 have been killed and 14 injured,” Ajay Sharma, a top local administrator, said. Senior police officer Ashok Kumar said that the bus had been “fished out of the water” after the accident, which occurred some 100km from state capital Shimla. India has the highest number of road accidents globally, with 138,000 recorded in 2012, the latest year for which official government figures are available.