Dehradun, 28 June 2026
Uttarakhand’s mountain roads witnessed two fatal accidents on Saturday, highlighting the growing danger of travel on the state’s narrow and unstable routes. Accidents involving vehicles plunging into deep gorges, boulders falling on running cars, and head-on collisions have become frequent, with fatalities on the rise as monsoon and peak pilgrimage traffic coincide.
On the Rishikesh-Badrinath National Highway near Mulyagaon, a 1.5-year-old girl, Noni, was killed when a truck carrying wheat from Panipat towards Srinagar started slipping backwards on an incline. A couple traveling on a motorcycle with their daughter could not react in time and came under the truck. The toddler died on the spot, and the accident led to a massive traffic jam for hours on the Devprayag road.
In another incident later in the day, a large boulder fell on a Bolero on the Gumkhal–Satpuli stretch of National Highway-534 near Satpuli Malli in Pauri Garhwal around 3:30 PM. The Bolero was traveling from Kotdwar to Satpuli when the rock crashed onto it during ongoing road widening work on the route. One person died on the spot, while two others were seriously injured. One of the injured was taken to hospital, and SDRF teams used cutting machines to rescue the second occupant who was trapped in the wreckage.
The road widening project from Gumkhal to Satpuli has been underway for several months, and local residents say frequent boulder falls have made the stretch increasingly hazardous. Authorities have been urged to expedite slope stabilization and safety measures as such incidents continue to claim lives across Uttarakhand’s hill highways.
Police have taken up investigations in both cases. May God grant peace to the departed souls and a speedy recovery to the injured.
