Twenty-one persons were killed and 15 injured when an overcrowded mini-bus fell into a 200-ft-deep gorge on Saturday after its driver lost control over the vehicle on Jammu-Srinagar national highway in Ramban district, officials said.

Among the dead were four women and the driver. Ten critically injured passengers were airlifted from the accident site to the Army hospital in Udhampur and two others to Jammu, they said.