At least 38 Hindu pilgrims were killed and over 40 injured overnight when an overcrowded bus plunged into a gorge in western India, police said Monday.

The private luxury bus was heading to Nasik town in Maharashtra state after visiting a popular Hindu shrine around 9:45 p.m. on Sunday when the brakes failed above a 183-meters gorge, a police representative operating the emergency control room told AFP over the phone.

The bus was designed to seat only 45 people but it was carrying about 80 passengers when it crashed, said N. Gupta, police superintendent at the Nashik police station quoted by CNN.

“The initial inquiry shows that the driver appears to have lost control of the bus while negotiating a sharp turn. There were also more passengers than should have been in the bus. We are investigating,” Gupta said.

The bus broke up into pieces because of the impact of the fall.

Most of the passengers were from Mumbai and the dead included 12 women and 4 children.

India is known for its great numbers of road accidents, which claim hundreds of lives every year. Reasons for most accidents include overcrowding, reckless driving and aging vehicles.

Nashik lies about 155 miles east of the state capital, Mumbai.