One passenger carriage was thrown off the track in the state of Jharkhand in the crash, which occurred around dawn in foggy conditions.

“Four people have died and five have been admitted to hospital with injuries,” local police official Vijaya Laxmi said.

“There are no further reported injuries, we are now repairing the track and expect things to get back to normal in a few hours,” she added. “There was fog, so I think the visibility was low.”

India’s last major train accident was in July when a packed train traveling from the eastern city of Kolkata to New Delhi derailed at high speed in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh, killing 63 people.

India’s state-run railway system — still the main form of long-distance travel despite fierce competition from new private airlines — carries 18.5 million people every day.

Experts say the system, the world’s second-largest under a single management group, is in need of new investment to improve safety and help end transport bottlenecks.

In another incident, a bus in northern India fell down a steep gorge in dense fog, killing 12 people and injuring 13 others. Spokesman Amit Chandola for the state government of Uttarakhand says the bus fell into the 100-meter-deep gorge in the Uttarkashi region early Wednesday.