LUCKNOW, India – Twelve members of a wedding party were among 31 feared drowned overnight in two separate boat accidents in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, officials said on Saturday.
"Two passenger boats sank killing 31 people in two different incidents," Anupam Shashank, a senior government official told the Associated Press from the state capital Lucknow. He said only five bodies had been recovered.
In the first incident, 19 people drowned when an overcrowded boat carrying 25 people sank midstream in the Yamuna river in Kaushambhi district, 15 miles southeast of Lucknow.
Six people swam to safety but the others drowned, Shashank said.
In the second incident a boat carrying 17 members of a wedding party sank in the Ganges river near Mirzapur, 200 miles southeast of Lucknow.
"Twelve people are feared dead and five swam to safety," Deputy Inspector General S.N. Sabat said.
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