At least 15 people were killed and 36 others injured, some of them critically, when the bus in which they were travelling skidded off the road and fell into a rivulet in Nagaland's Mokokchung district, the police said on Tuesday.

The mishap occurred on Monday when the bus was negotiating a sharp turn at a place about 13 km from Mokokchung town and tumbled about 150 feet down the gorge of the boulder-strewn stream, killing 12 people on the spot.

Three persons died later in the hospital, police said.

The driver of the bus, which was moving from Mokokchung towards Tuli in Assam-Nagaland border area, was absconding while the handle man received grievous injuries.

All the injured were admitted to Imkongliba district civil hospital at Mokokchung, where the condition of at least six persons was stated to be critical.