<div><span style="font-size: 1rem;">At least 31 people were killed after a bus carrying wedding guests veered off the road and fell into a deep gorge in northern India, police said Wednesday.</span><br></div><div><br></div><div>The vehicle was travelling along a treacherous mountain highway in Uttarakhand state when it careened over an edge and plunged at least 500 metres (1,640 feet) with dozens of people onboard.</div><div><br></div><div>The state's police force said on Twitter that rescue operations had concluded with 31 bodies recovered and 19 injured passengers rescued.</div><div><br></div><div>Prime Minister Narendra Modi said that "all possible assistance" would be given to the survivors.</div><div><br></div><div>"In this tragic hour my thoughts are with the bereaved families," he tweeted on Wednesday.</div><div><br></div><div>Fatal road accidents are common in Uttarakhand, which encompasses part of the Indian Himalayas and is home to numerous religious pilgrimage sites.</div><div><br></div><div>Nearly two dozen people were killed in June when their bus plunged into a gorge while en route to a shrine to the Hindu deity Yamuna, north of the state capital Dehradun.</div><div><br></div><div>India accounts for 11 percent of the global road death toll despite only having one percent of the world's vehicles, according to a World Bank report released last year.</div><div><br></div><div>The same report estimated 150,000 car crash fatalities in India annually, or one person every four minutes.</div><div><br></div><div>It added that road crashes cost the Indian economy around $75 billion each year, with medical expenses and loss of income driving many accident survivors into poverty. - AFP&nbsp;</div><div><br></div><div>bnbd24/fas</div>