VARANASI: Three women and three children, all from the same family, were feared drowned when a boat capsized in the river Ganga near Akhada Ghat under Vindhyachal police station in Mirzapur district on Wednesday afternoon.
Police later engaged divers with nets to find the missing women and children. DIG Vindhya range RK Bhardwaj, district magistrate Mirzapur Pravin Lakshkar, SP Ajay Kumar and other officials were camping at Akhada Ghat to monitor the operations.
The DIG said, “NDRF personnel and flood relief teams have also been called for a search operation, which had already been launched with locally available divers.”
According to police, one Rajesh Tiwari from Ghuraha area in Ranchi of Jharkhand along with 11 family members and a driver had reached Vindhyachal to offer prayer. Before entering the temple, they reached Akhada Ghat for bathing in the Ganga.
Tiwari said that before they could start bathing, a boatman convinced him and his family to go to the opposite bank of the river on his boat for sight seeing and bathing. After bathing on the opposite bank, they boarded the boat to return. In the meantime it started raining heavily and Tiwari asked the boatman to wait. He alleged that the boatman said that no problem will be faced in crossing the river despite rain.
However, when the boat reached midstream water started seeping into the boat and the boat capsized.
Police said that apart from Tiwari, Vikas (28), Deepak (27), Alka (9), Ritika (7) and their driver were rescued by the people and boatmen present near the ghat. However, Gudia (28), Khushbu (30), Anisha (26), Satyam (5), a two-year-old and a three-month-old girl were feared drowned.
Hectic efforts were being made to search for the missing women and children but due to strong current in the river stream, problems were being faced in the search operation.
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