8 died after SUV fell into pond in Chhattisgarh: Police

Eight persons were killed after a sports utility vehicle (SUV) fell into a pond in Chhattisgarh’s Balrampur district on Saturday night, police said on Sunday.
The incident took place at Ladua turn on Budha Bagicha road under the Rajpur police station area.
“Six bodies were recovered from the accident site late Saturday night and two on Sunday morning. The driver also succumbed to his injuries while being shifted to hospital,” said Vaibhav Bankar, the superintendent of police, Balrampur.
The SP said that a total of eight people were travelling in the SUV, and no one survived.
The deceased have been identified as Sanjay Munda (35), his wife Chandravati (35), their daughter Kirti (8), their neighbours Mangal Das (19), Bhupendra Munda (18), Baleshwar (18) and Udaynath (20) and driver Mukesh Das (26).
“The victims were heading from Larima (Balrampur) to neighbouring Surajpur district,” said the SP.
He said that as per preliminary information, the driver failed to negotiate the turn following which the SUV skidded off the road and plunged into the small pond.
“A police team was rushed to the spot and the rescue operation started on Saturday night. The bodies of six people were fished out on Saturday night and two were recovered on Sunday morning,” the SP added.
The SUV was also pulled out of the pond using a machine, the official said.