Karanjia/Soro: Two separate incidents of lightning strike took four lives including three women today in Karanjia and Soro localities of Odisha’s Mayurbhanj and Balasore districts, respectively.

In the first incident, three women were electrocuted and five others sustained severe burn injuries in the afternoon at around 3 pm at Ankura of Ward No-15 under Karanjia civic limits of Mayurbhanj.

The deceased women were identified as Subasini Das (70), Jibati Naik (30) and Hemalata Ho (25). Hemalata was an expectant mother.

The injured were identified as Jubati Naik, Malati Naik, Bhuban Ho, Sonali Baske and a minor girl Tejeswari Naik. The five injured were admitted to a hospital in Karanjia.

According to a source, a woman named Mukta Munda from the same village had died in the morning. After getting information about her death, the woman’s relatives from nearby areas came to the village to take part in the funeral rites and congregated under a mango tree. Unfortunately, a thundershower began all of a sudden and lightning striked the eight women, who had taken shelter under the tree.

In the second incident, a 25-year-old man identified as Bapun Behera from Mitrapurpatana village under Nilagiri police limits in Balasore died today due to the lightning strike. Bapun got electrocuted when he was supervising a road laying work of the Works department at Mangalpur locality of Gopinathpur panchayat under Soro police limits in the district. He was working as a supervisor under a local contractor.

The fatal mishap occurred in the afternoon. Bapun was rescued by some locals with the help of workers present at the site and admitted to Soro government hospital. However, he was declared ‘brought dead’ by doctors at the health facility, the contractor from Khantapada Kamalakanta Panda said.