Rescuers worked into the night searching for survivors after a passenger train derailed in India's northern state of Uttar Pradesh, killing at least 23 people and injuring several others, officials said.

At least eight carriages derailed in the crash close to Muzaffarnagar, in Uttar Pradesh state, about 130 km (80 miles) north of the capital New Delhi, as the train travelled towards the Hindu holy city of Haridwar.

Train crashes are frequent in India, which has the world's fourth-biggest rail network. Poor investment in past decades in the vast network and rising demand means overcrowded trains are running on creaking infrastructure.

Yesterday's accident is at least the fourth major passenger train derailment this year and the third in Uttar Pradesh in 2017. A crash in November in Uttar Pradesh killed 150 people.

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