BENGALURU: A 50-year-old man from Kalaburagi, who was travelling to Mansarovar with a group of pilgrims, recounted how they narrowly escaped the flash flood in Nepal after their bus driver quickly moved the vehicle to higher ground.
Mallinath, speaking to the TNIE on Thursday, said the group had left for Kathmandu at around 6 am on Wednesday and was travelling towards Mansarovar when they witnessed the flashing flood near a place called Battar.
“We were travelling from Kathmandu to Mansarovar by bus. After around three hours, near a place called Battar, we suddenly witnessed a flood. There was a bridge and the Trishuli River was flowing nearby. And suddenly, we heard a sound similar to that of an explosion, followed by gushing water,” he said.
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Mallinath said, the bus driver immediately drove the vehicle to a higher location, taking all the passengers to safety.
“There are 28 people on the bus, including me. Of them, another passenger and I are from Karnataka. We are all safe,” he said. Mallinath added that six other people who were in touch with him were stranded near Saga, a town in Tibet that serves as a major overnight halt and transit point for travellers on the overland route to Lake Manasarovar.
He and his group have safely returned to Kathmandu and are scheduled to reach Delhi on Friday, as per arrangements made by their travel agency. Mallinath had begun his journey from Hyderabad on August 21 for the Mansarovar pilgrimage.