Noida bus fire: passengers warned driver of burning smell; 17 challans pending against vehicle

Passengers of the ill-fated bus that caught fire on the Yamuna Expressway early on Thursday, killing nine people, had alerted the driver and conductor about a burning smell but were talked down by the duo, who were also smoking inside the vehicle, said an FIR filed by a survivor from Hamirpur district.

The bus caught fire on the Yamuna Expressway, 5km from the newly inaugurated Noida International Airport. The driver refused to stop when the fire started and allegedly told the passengers, “If you want to die, then die; we won’t stop the bus.”

The Hindu has found that the bus, a sleeper coach registered in Bihar and operated by Raj Kalpana Travels, had 17 pending challans amounting to ₹1.59 lakh at the time of the incident. It had accumulated 55 challans in Delhi and Uttar Pradesh between April 2023 and August 2026, according to records on the Parivahan platform. The violations included driving without a licence, breaches of permit conditions, failure to carry requisite documents, overspeeding, carrying goods on the roof and violations of safety norms.