At least 14 people died and 32 others were injured in three separate road accidents in Dhading, Baitadi and Udayapur districts on Sunday.

A Kathmandu-bound night bus swerved off the road and plunged into the Trishuli river at Gajuri-6 along the Prithvi Highway in Dhading district on Sunday morning, killing nine persons and injuring 29 others.

Superintendent of Police Rajkumar Baidawar, who reached the site for rescue, said eight men and one woman were killed in the crash.

The vehicle with registration number Na 7 Kha 4387 was en route to Kathmandu from Kakadbhitta, Jhapa. According to an injured, there was a change of drivers after the bus was replenished with fuel at Galaudi, around eight kilometres from the incident site.

Twenty-nine passengers, including a Cameroonian national, are receiving treatment at Nepal Mediciti Hospital in Lalitpur and the National Trauma Centre in Kathmandu. Security personnel reached the incident site and rescued the victims. The cause of the accident is not immediately known, and an investigation is under way, police said.

In Baitadi, three persons died and as many others sustained injuries in a jeep accident at Dasharath Chand Municipality-11. The vehicle (Ga 1 Ja 4921), which was heading to Nagarjun from Dehimandau, fell 150 metres below the road.

In Udayapur, two persons were killed in a tipper truck accident at Katari Municipality-14 along the Katari-Ghurmi road section. According to Dinesh Kumar Chaudhary, in charge of the district traffic police, the vehicle fell over a cliff. The bodies were recovered from a place about 700 metres below the road, he added.