Five members of a family died while another went missing as a taxi swerved off the road and plunged into the Trishuli river near Muglin on Saturday.

The taxi they were travelling in plunged into the Trishuli river at Simaldhara of Ichchhakamana Rural Municipality-5 along the Prithvi Highway. Police identified the deceased as taxi driver Arjun Sirmal, 32, Junkiri Roka, 70, Harimaya Roka, 41, Anjana Roka, 29 and a nine-year-old boy. Eighteen-year-old Bibas Roka went missing in the river.

The victims are the permanent residents of Pauwakhet in Gorkha Municipality Ward 7.

There were six people aboard the taxi at the time of the fatal crash. The victims were travelling to Gorkha from Kathmandu. They went to the Capital on Friday to attend the funeral of Shankar Roka, the son of septuagenarian Junkiri. The missing teen is Shankar’s son, while Harimaya and Anjana are his sisters. The driver is his brother-in-law.

The 39-year-old Shankar died of cancer in Kathmandu. The family members and relatives were returning to Gorkha in three vehicles after cremating Shankar in Aryaghat.

“We were returning home in two taxis and one micro bus after cremating the body at around 11pm. We stopped all three vehicles in Charaudi at around 4 am. We moved toward Mugling after staying there for about 20 minutes,” said Prakash Roka, who drove another taxi.

“I reached Muglin and waited for another taxi and microbus. The microbus arrived after some time but the taxi did not arrive even after 15 minutes. I called Arjun but he did not pick up the call. Later he called me back. He said in a faint voice that the vehicle he was driving plunged into the river and urged to save him.”

According to Prakash, they rushed toward Kurintar and spotted broken roadside crash barriers in the Simaldhara area. “The vehicle was submerged into the river when we reached there,” he added.

The security personnel and the divers from Armed Police Force Disaster Management Training Centre at Kurintar were mobilised to find the missing victim but to no avail. The search will continue on Sunday, said police. The bodies were taken to Gorkha Hospital for postmortem examination.