{"id":1332,"date":"2016-01-12T14:00:00","date_gmt":"2016-01-12T14:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/?p=1332"},"modified":"2016-01-19T14:08:44","modified_gmt":"2016-01-19T14:08:44","slug":"my-heart-is-breaking-australian-family-killed-in-horrific-crash-in-india","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/?p=1332","title":{"rendered":"‘My heart is breaking’: Australian family killed in horrific crash in India"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"heart\"<\/a>An Australian family who died in a horrific highway crash in India while travelling\u00a0to the Taj Mahal\u00a0were nearing the end of a six-week holiday to visit family when the tragedy occurred, according to a colleague.<\/p>\n

Rupen\u00a0Datta, a restaurant owner from Adelaide, survived the crash on the Yamuna Expressway in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh on Sunday afternoon.<\/p>\n

But he is now faced with\u00a0the devastating\u00a0loss\u00a0of his\u00a0wife Anamika\u00a0and their three\u00a0children – daughters Neetika and Pipasa, aged 12 and 15, and son\u00a0Tirvijai, 20 – and Anamika’s sister Sonia, 25, who all died in the crash.<\/p>\n

The family had\u00a0left the Indian city of Delhi\u00a0and were driving towards the Taj Mahal along the six-lane Yamuna\u00a0Expressway on Sunday afternoon, according to the Times of India<\/em>.\u00a0Also in the\u00a0Toyota Qualis\u00a0were Mrs\u00a0Datta’s\u00a0father, identified by police\u00a0as NK\u00a0Paliwal, and the driver,\u00a0Shambhu\u00a0Paswan.<\/p>\n

Police said one of the vehicle’s tyres\u00a0burst about 3.30pm, local time, causing the vehicle to crash into a safety barrier, then a road divider, before the vehicle overturned and landed on the incorrect side of the highway.\u00a0A number of the victims were thrown from the vehicle in the crash, police said.<\/p>\n

Residents of a nearby village tried to help the family before police arrived, but the two women and two girls\u00a0died at the scene. Tirvijai was taken to Mathura Hospital where he died a short time later, police said.<\/p>\n

Mr Datta\u00a0suffered serious head injuries and is receiving treatment in hospital, a family friend said, adding that “my heart is breaking for all the friends, colleagues, family”.<\/p>\n

Mr\u00a0Paliwal and Mr Paswan\u00a0also survived the crash, according to local media reports, and were being treated in hospital.<\/p>\n

Mr Datta owns the Urban India restaurant in Mile End in Adelaide’s\u00a0inner west.\u00a0An employee at the restaurant told Fairfax Media on Tuesday that Mr Datta\u00a0and his family were about five weeks into a six-week trip to India to visit\u00a0family.<\/p>\n

“We have heard that there was an accident, and we are trying to contact other relatives in India [to find out what happened],” the employee said.<\/p>\n

Mr Datta, who\u00a0is originally from Delhi,\u00a0had owned the restaurant in Adelaide for the past 10 years, the employee said.<\/p>\n

The Australian Department of Foreign Affairs at Trade confirmed the deaths of the Australians.<\/p>\n

“[DFAT] is providing consular assistance in accordance with the Consular Services Charter to members of a family of Australians who passed away following a traffic accident in Uttar Pradesh, India,” a spokeswoman said in a statement.<\/p>\n

“Due to privacy obligations, we are unable to provide any further comment.”<\/p>\n

Source: SMH<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

An Australian family who died in a horrific highway crash in India while travelling\u00a0to the…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1333,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[],"tags":[5,9,31,1],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["http:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/heart.png",620,348,false],"thumbnail":["http:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/heart-150x150.png",150,150,true],"medium":["http:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/heart-300x168.png",300,168,true],"medium_large":["http:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/heart.png",620,348,false],"large":["http:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/heart.png",620,348,false],"1536x1536":["http:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/heart.png",620,348,false],"2048x2048":["http:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/heart.png",620,348,false],"enternews-featured":["http:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/heart.png",620,348,false],"enternews-medium":["http:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/heart.png",620,348,false],"enternews-thumbnail":["http:\/\/southasiantimes.com.au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/heart.png",480,269,false]},"author_info":{"display_name":"admin","author_link":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/?author=1"},"category_info":"Uncategorized","tag_info":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1332"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1332"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1332\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1334,"href":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1332\/revisions\/1334"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1333"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1332"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1332"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.southasiantimes.com.au\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1332"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}