It was an unlucky wedding from the word go.

There had been a death in the groom's family a day before the ill-fated marriage party left for venue.

• 53 dead in train mishap near Nagpur

To make things worse, celebrations turned into mourning when a speeding train rammed into the vehicle that the marriage party was travelling in at an unmanned level at Kanhan, about 30 km from Nagpur, killing 53 people late on Thursday afternoon.

Naresh, son of Baliram Naktu Natkar, a resident of Kachurwahi in Nagpur district, was to get married to Devyani alias Shubhangi, daughter of Gangadhar Sarode, a resident of Kanhan.

The wedding was slated for Thursday morning.

However, there was a touch of the inauspicious when Yashodabai Natkar (85), paternal grandmother of the groom, died on the eve of the wedding on Wednesday.

However, the family decided to go ahead with the wedding in spite of the tragedy since all the preparations had been completed.

Yashodabai's funeral procession started from the Natkar residence on Thursday morning. The family performed the last rites and returned home.

A little while later, Naresh's baraat (marriage party) left for Kanhan for the wedding.

The wedding was solemnised in what was a subdued function. After the ceremonies and the customary lunch, the main marriage party, comprising over 70 relatives and friends of the groom, left Kanhan to return home to Kachurwahi in a tractor-trolley.

In a providential turn of events, the newly-weds decided not to travel with the marriage party, preferring to return home in a separate vehicle.

Little did they know how fateful the return journey would be for many of the group.

A train was approaching an unmanned level crossing.

The driver, Bharat Kodawate, did not stop and began crossing the tracks. Kodawate either did not see the train and hear its horn or misjudged its distance from the crossing.

The tractor had almost crossed the track when the trolley got stuck.

The speeding Ramtek-Nagpur local, travelling at a speed of around 70 km per hour, rammed into the trolley and dragged it to a distance of nearly 200 metres before coming to a halt.

Several occupants of the trolley were thrown out and fell dead in the surrounding fields.

Kodawate survived the mishap, which left at least 53 dead, most of them women.

A pall of gloom has descended over Kachurwahi since the news of the tragedy reached the village.