THE BODIES of 33 people who had been travelling on a bus that plunged into a 150-metre deep gorge in western India have been found.

The bus was carrying 34 passengers when it plunged into the gorge after unsuccessfully negotiating a bend in the Western Ghats mountain range in Maharashtra state, local police official Prakash Pawar said.

“There were 34 passengers on the bus, one person who jumped out survived,” police spokesman Kundan Gawade said.

The bus was carrying employees of an agricultural university located in the town of Dapoli to the hill station of Mahabaleshwar.

The group was on an annual outing.

One of the passengers jumped off the bus while the accident was happening, and managed to clamber up the hillside and report the disaster, Officer Pawar said.

The sole survivor has been identified as Prakash Sawant Desai, according to police inspector Balkrushna Jadhav of Raigad police.

Police said the passengers were from Dr Balasaheb Sawant Konkan Krishi Vidyapeeth, an agricultural university at Dapoli in Ratnagiri district, and were going on a picnic to Mahabaleshawar.

As they were crossing a sharp turn at Poladpur around 11.30am, the driver lost control and the bus fell into the gorge, according to the Hindustani Times.

The victims were university employees headed to a picnic.

A team from the National Disaster Relief Force was assisting in rescue operations.

India has the highest number of traffic fatalities worldwide, with an average of about 135,000 people dying per year on the country’s roads.

One person is killed in a road accident every four minutes, according to government data.

Common causes are bad roads, non-roadworthy vehicles and reckless driving.

On July 1 of this year a bus crash in Northern India killed 45 people after the bus lost control and split in two.

Then on July 19, yet another bus crash killed 14 people and injuring 17 others after plunging into a gorge in India’s North.

India’s hill roads are particularly prone to accidents during the rainy monsoon season that runs from June to September.