Two dead, 40 hurt as school picnic bus crashes in Gopalganj

A group of picnic-goers from a Jashore school were returning from Gopalganj when they met with the accident

Two people have been killed and at least 40 others injured after a bus carrying a group of picnic-goers from a Jashore school crashed into a roadside tree in Gopalganj’s Kashiani.

The accident took place in Kashiani’s Bhatiapara area around 8:30 pm on Thursday as the bus from Bakri Bahumukhi School was returning to Jashore from Gopalganj’s Tungipara.

The dead have been identified as Sudipta Biswas, 35, a lab assistant at the school, and Biddut Kumar Biswas, 45, a parent of one of the school students.

At least 20 people have been admitted to Jashore General Hospital for treatment.

The school’s assistant teacher, Biswajit Kumar Pal, said a total of 150 people, including ninth and tenth-graders, their parents and teachers, travelled to Tungipara for the picnic.

“One of the buses of the picnic group attempted to overtake a bus in the Bhatiapara intersection and overturned after hitting a roadside tree,” the teacher said.

The bus had at least 50 passengers on board, the teacher said, adding that Biddut died on the spot.

Locals rushed the injured to different hospitals in the area and many among them have been taken to Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical College Hospital in Faridpur, according to the teacher.

“The injured who received first aid in Kashiani were moved to Jashore General Hospital in five ambulances by 10:30 pm. Among them, Sudipta died while undergoing treatment,” the teacher added.

Saifur Rahman, a doctor at the Jashore hospital’s Emergency Department said they couldn’t make a list of the total number of patients who had received treatment after the accident as they had to attend to a lot of patients in the hospital.