At least 21 labourers were killed while one person miraculously survived after a truck carrying them skidded off a narrow mountain road and fell into a deep gorge near Metengliang in Arunachal Pradesh’s Anjaw district, officials said on Thursday.
Anjaw superintendent of police (SP) Anurag Dwivedi said the group of 22 labourers had left Assam’s Tinsukia district on December 7 for Chaglagam, where they were engaged for construction work. When they failed to arrive by December 10, their associates raised an alarm at the Hayuliang police station.
“Hayuliang police then activated local sources to trace the missing workers. During the search, officers were alerted by a Border Roads Task Force (BRTF) camp that an injured man had reached the camp claiming his truck had crashed with 21 others on board. He was given first aid and later shifted to Assam via Tezu for advanced treatment”, he said.
Preliminary inquiry suggests the accident occurred on December 8 between 8pm and 9pm, around 11km from Chaglagam, when the vehicle skidded off the road and plunged into a deep valley. With no mobile connectivity in the region, the tragedy went unreported for nearly two days.
Dwivedi said the survivor’s statement helped police narrow down the crash location, following which teams from the army, Border Roads Organisation (BRO), local police and district administration were mobilised for search and rescue. A National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) team has also been requisitioned.
“As of now, 17 bodies have been sighted, and retrieval operations are under way. The terrain is extremely challenging, with the gorge nearly 700 metres deep,” DySP Habung Sama said, adding that the case is currently being treated as an accident.
According to officials, 18 of the 22 labourers were residents of the Gilapukhuri Tea Estate in Assam’s Tinsukia district.
