The horrific accident took place near Haveri town, about 330 km from here in northern Karnataka. It comes close on the heels of the Oct 30 Andhra Pradesh accident when 45 passengers perished in a similar private-run luxury bus fire at Mahbubnagar.

Thursday's accident "took place around 2.45 a.m. when the luxury bus of Volvo from Bangalore to Mumbai hit the railing of a bridge on National Highway 4 (NH 4) at high speed and caught fire as its fuel tank burst," Haveri Superintendent of Police M. Shashi Kumar told IANS.