AGRA: Almost 20 days after a multi-vehicle pile-up on the Yamuna Expressway that claimed 19 lives, the fate of two victims—a woman passenger and a bus conductor—remains unresolved, with no physical remains conclusively traced to either of them despite extensive forensic examination. The Mathura administration has now constituted a five-member committee to probe the circumstances surrounding their deaths.The accident occurred in the early hours of Dec 16 near Milestone 127 under Baldev police station, when more than a dozen vehicles, including several buses, rammed into each other amid dense fog and caught fire. Eighteen people were burnt alive, while another succumbed to injuries at SN Medical College, Agra. Around 100 others were injured.Most bodies were charred beyond recognition. Police managed to recover 18 sets of burnt remains and carried out DNA profiling by matching samples provided by victims’ families at forensic laboratories in Agra and Lucknow. While 19 victims were officially identified, DNA samples of two missing persons—Parvati, a resident of Hamirpur, and Bholu, a bus conductor from Dholpur—did not match any of the recovered remains.Officials said Parvati was travelling by bus to Noida with her two children—Prachi (8) and Sunny (12)—to meet her husband when the pile-up occurred. After the collision, the bus caught fire, trapping passengers inside.As flames spread rapidly, Parvati broke the bus window and pushed both Prachi and Sunny out to safety. Recounting the moments before the fire spread, Prachi told TOI that their mother asked them to get down from the bus, saying, “You get down, I am getting down too.” While the children managed to escape, flames surrounded Parvati. “We kept screaming outside, but couldn’t save our mother,” Prachi said.Similarly, Bholu has also not been traced since the accident. His sister, Sitara, told TOI that he was on one of the buses that caught fire. “Where else could he have gone?” she said.With unanswered questions surrounding the two deaths, the Mathura administration on Friday constituted a five-member committee, headed by a magistrate-level officer, with representatives from the police, transport and health departments, to examine why their remains could not be recovered.Mathura DM CP Singh said on Saturday, “Based on DNA analysis and scientific examination, the charred bodies recovered were handed over to families. We remain in constant touch with the families of the two missing victims. I am sure things will be clear in the coming days.”
