GUJRAT: A school administrator and two students died and 22 others were injured when a minibus carrying a group of students and teachers of a Lahore school to Murree fell from an overhead bridge along GT Road near Jhelum’s Dina city early on Sunday morning.

Rescue 1122 ambulances and other officials reached the spot soon after the incident and shifted the deceased and injured to Jhelum’s District Headquarters (DHQ) hospital.

Rescue officials said the accident took place when a loader tried to overtake the coaster on the overhead bridge on railway track along GT Road and the coaster veered off the road and fell on the track.

Jhelum Deputy Commissioner Nauman Hafeez Kalair who reached the spot soon after the incident told Dawn that two coasters carrying the passengers of a school trip from Inayat High School, Begumkot, Lahore, had been going to Murree hill station. Around half past four in the morning, he said, one of the coasters hit the safety railing after a loader tried to overtake it and the coaster fell on the railway track.

He said school administrator Imran, 45, and two students died while 22 others, most of them girls, were injured.

One of the critically injured persons was shifted to a Rawalpindi hospital whereas others were admitted to the Jhelum DHQ hospital where the condition of all was stated to be out of danger.

The DC said he immediately had the railway traffic between Lahore and Rawalpindi stopped to avoid any further tragedy. The track was later opened for trains after the rescue teams removed the coaster.

Federal Minister for Information and Broadcast Chaudhry Fawad Hussain has expressed his grief over the tragic incident near his hometown Jhelum. He expressed sympathies with the families of the departed souls.

MURDERER HELD: Police claim to have arrested the man involved in the brutal murder of an 11-year-old student.

The suspect administered tranquiliser to the boy and raped and killed him at Iqbal Colony of Jalalpur Jattan city the other day.

Gujrat District Police Officer Umar Salamat told reporters at a news conference that the body of Meesam Imtiaz had been found from an under-construction house on Dec 2 last after his family launched search when he did not return home from a nearby tuition centre.

The DPO said he had constituted a team under Saddar DSP Hafiz Imtiaz and the Jalalpur Jattan city SHO to trace and arrest the suspect whereas a team of forensic experts also collected evidence from the scene that led to the arrest of suspect Kifayat Ali, a resident of the area where the slain boy’s family live.

The man confessed to raping and killing the boy at a deserted place after administering tranquiliser. A case had already been lodged against the nominated suspect under sections 303 and 377 of Pakistan Penal Code on the report of Imtiaz Ahmed, the father of the deceased.

Published in Dawn, December 6th, 2021