In a tragic incident, a 17-year-old boy drowned and another went missing during Chhath Puja celebrations in Uttar Pradesh’s Mirzapur district on Monday, police said.
The incident took place around noon at Nifra village, where five people had entered the Ganga for a bath and began to drown, news agency PTI reported.
A local boatman, Lau Nishad, managed to rescue three of them—Shivam Pandey (25), Shivam Sharma (17), and Som Pandey (11)—by throwing an oar toward them.
However, two boys, Anurag Saroj (17) and Om Pandey (16), were swept away by the current. Later in the evening, divers recovered Anurag’s body, while efforts were underway to locate Om, said Vindhyachal Station House Officer Ved Prakash Pandey.
Police and local teams remained on-site to
assist with the search operation.
In a separate incident reported on the same day, four children drowned while taking a bath in the Ganga in Bihar’s Bhagalpur district. The incident took place at Navtoliya.
“The children, two of them residents of adjoining Chhathu Singh Tola village, had all been brought to the ghat by their family members,” PTI quoted Naugachia SP Prerna Kumar as saying.
He said that while taking a bath, the children slipped into the river. After getting the information, police and administration officials rushed to the spot, and divers pulled them out. The children were taken to a nearby hospital, where they were declared as brought dead. All the deceased were in the age group of 10-15 years, the SP added.
Chief Minister Nitish Kumar expressed condolences to the families of the deceased, calling the incident “deeply tragic” and praying for the strength of the families to endure their loss.
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