Twenty-four students were missing late Sunday after being washed downstream by a sudden surge of river water in a remote Himalayan valley in northern India, a state minister said. The students had stopped to take photographs on the edge of the Beas river in Himachal Pradesh when water released from a dam washed them downstream, transport minister G.S Bali said. Rescue workers using torches in the dark were attempting to find the students in the picturesque Kullu Valley.