MANSEHRA: A son, daughter-in-law and a grandson of former chairman of the Board of Intermediate and Secondary Education, Abbottabad, Mohammad Pervez, died, and five other members of his family sustained critical injuries when a vehicle they were travelling in plunged into a ravine in the Damgalla area of Balakot here on Friday, a Rescue 1122 official said.

The vehicle skidded off the Mansehra-Naran-Jalkhad Road and plunged into a gorge after the driver lost control of it while negotiating a sharp turn, rescue official Mohammad Sami Khan said.

He said the family of Mr Pervez was on its way to Balakot from Mansehra town.

He said rescuers and residents rushed to the scene and shifted the injured and bodies to the Tehsil Headquarters Hospital, where doctors pronounced Mohammad Zeeshan, his wife and son, Afan, dead, Mr Khan said.

The official said another five members of the former board chairman’s family, including his daughter and four grandsons, sustained critical injuries and were referred to King Abdullah Teaching Hospital from the Balakot Hospital and then to Ayub Medical Complex Hospital, Abbottabad, where the condition of two of them was stated to be critical.

Separately, the police have arrested the prime suspect in the murder case of two women after a local court cancelled his pre-arrest bail.

Azaz Ali, who was nominated in the FIR by the family after the murder of two women earlier this year in the Dodial area here, had gone into hiding to evade arrest.

The accused had stormed the house of his rivals and opened indiscriminate fire, leaving two women dead on the spot.

BODY RECOVERED: The body of a girl, who was swept away by a swollen nullah, along with her mother, in the Sahibabad area, was recovered on Friday.

Ibrar Ali, the district emergency officer of Rescue 1122, told reporters that Saima Bibi, 40, along with her daughter, Horain, 13, was going to her home in the Sahibabad area when both of them slipped into a roadside nullah and were swept away by torrents downstream. Their bodies were later found in different localities.

Mr Ali said heavy rain coupled with a hailstorm started lashing different parts of Hazara division, including Mansehra, on Thursday night and continued until Friday morning, causing widespread damage to standing crops of maize, potatoes, tomatoes, peas and rice.

Published in Dawn, September 26th, 2026