Rescue operation to save the two-year-old boy, stuck in a 150-foot-borewell in Punjab’s Sangrur since 6 June, continued on Monday with a team of National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) digging a tunnel parallel to the abandoned borewell.

The child, Fatehveer, fell into the unused borewell in a field when he was playing near his house at around 4 pm on 6 June. The seven-inch-wide borewell was covered with a cloth and the boy accidentally stepped on it.

The Indian Army personnel have also been rushed to expedite the rescue operation. A team of doctors and ambulances have been stationed at the spot to provide emergency aid.

Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh said he is constantly monitoring the rescue operations by NDRF, local administration and outside experts.

“Have directed all DCs to ensure that no such open borewell exists in any of the districts and have asked them to submit a report within 24 hours. You can call on our helpline number 0172-2740397 if you have information about any such open borewells in your area,” Amarinder tweeted.

Have directed all DCs to ensure that no such open borewell exists in any of the districts & have asked them to submit a report within 24 hours. You can call on our helpline number 0172-2740397 if you have information about any such open borewells in your area.

— Capt.Amarinder Singh (@capt_amarinder) June 10, 2019

Meanwhile, Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD) president Sukhbir Singh Badal on Monday held the CM responsible for the tardy and unprofessional rescue operation undertaken by his government to rescue Fatehveer from a borewell in Bhagwanpura village in Sangrur.

The results would have been very different if the CM had acted speedily and called in experts to come out to the aid of the young boy and the aggrieved family. In a statement, the SAD president said the young toddler and his family had been failed by the CM who did not give any express orders for a special operation to rescue Fatehveer and instead left it to the district administration and volunteers to rescue the young boy.

Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) Member of Parliament Bhagwant Mann also expressed his dismay and deep shock over the tardy operation to rescue Fatehveer, and accused the rescue teams of having failed to bring out the trapped infant to safety even as more than 94 hours had rolled by since the operation took off.

Mann accused the local administration and state government of their failure to take an urgent call in the matter thus delaying the operation to rescue the infant who, he said, was fighting a grim battle between life and death.

The AAP leader said that the lack of technical know-how and unavailability of sophisticated devices has led to the inordinate delay in the successful completion of the ongoing operation to save the child.

Mann demanded that the government should immediately dispatch expert rescue teams with high-end apparatus to expedite the rescue operation and taking it to a conclusive end thus saving the life of the infant, sooner than later.