Five children including two minor girls who went to play in an agricultural area near their house on Sunday drowned one after another to save the first one who slipped into a pond, about 8 feet deep, at Udasar village of Tehsil Anupgarh in Rajasthan’s Sriganganagar district.
The deceased were identified as Nisha, 13, Bhawana 12, Ashish 10, Rajesh alias Vishal 6, and Ankit, 10, an Investigation Officer (IO) of Ramsinghpur Police Station Dolaram told SNS when contacted.
The victims were cousin sisters and brothers of a joint family living in Udasar. The villagers, when they did not find them playing near the pond, doubted and informed the police. The bodies were taken out and sent for postmortem, the IO said.
The pall of gloom descended in the village when their death news went viral and bodies reached the mortuary, the IO said.
In a similar incident, two young boys Rahmatullah and Akram drowned in a pond at Bedanti Kala of Phalodi district, the police said.
In his tweet, Chief Minister Ashok Gehlot expressed his sorrow saying, ” he news of the death of five children in Udasar and two youths in Phalodi district is very sad. My deepest sympathies are with the parents and family of the children, may God give them strength in this very difficult time”.