Rescuers use excavators to pull a tractor-trailer from a passenger bus after an accident in Sukkur. PHOTO: AFP

PANO AKIL: A passenger coach collided with a tractor on National Highway near the Sanghi area of Sukkur, leaving at least 42 people dead, Express News reported on Sunday.



Police said that 17 people were also wounded when the coach collided with the tractor pulling a trolley.



According to the police, the coach was travelling from Dera Ghazi Khan to Karachi.



The dead included 14 children and 13 women, they said.



Fida Hussain Shah, a senior police officer in Sukkur who gave the casualty figure, said the bus driver was killed on the spot while the driver of the tractor-trolley was wounded.



Police said the cause of the accident was yet not clear. Tractor-trolleys are a common form of transportation in rural areas.



All the dead and injured were riding in the bus, apart from the tractor driver.



Sharjeel Kharal, another senior police official, confirmed the incident.



Most of the injured were in critical condition and many were transferred to hospital in Karachi after initial treatment in Sukkur.



Among the dead were six members of a ten-person family travelling in the bus. Two more family members were injured while two were unhurt - Maryam Bibi, 18 and her six-year-old brother Samad.



"We were ten members of one family, six of them died and two were injured," a weeping Bibi said as she recounted the accident.



The family was travelling to visit other relatives in Karachi, she said.



Police and rescue teams reached the site of the accident soon after the incident.



Pakistan has one of the world’s worst records for fatal traffic accidents, blamed on poor roads, badly maintained vehicles and reckless driving.