A heart-wrenching news has emerged from the tribal-dominated Korba district of Chhattisgarh, where a quiet rural environment turned into screams and mourning in a moment on Thursday afternoon. Three innocent girls drowned while taking bath in Algu pond located in a village of Pali police station area under Pali development block of the district due to the deep flow of water and not being able to judge the depth. By the time the family members and villagers became aware of this untoward incident, all three innocent lives were lost underwater. As soon as the news of this sudden death of three girls from the same locality was received, there was deep mourning in the entire area and every eye became moist. All three friends were residents of the same colony: had come to the pond to take bath in the afternoon without going to school. The three innocent girls who died untimely in this heart-wrenching accident have been identified as 7-year-old Indu Agariya, 8-year-old Rakhi and 8-year-old Sadhna. According to the information received, all three girls lived nearby in the same locality and were close friends, who always used to play and jump together. On Thursday morning, the three girls did not go to school for some reason and were playing at their respective homes. In the afternoon, when most of the elders of the village were busy in the fields, labor and daily work, while playing, these three went towards the Algu pond located at the end of the village without informing their family members. At that time, due to the strong afternoon sun, no adult villagers were present on the ghats and surrounding banks of the pond, due to which there was no one to warn them of the danger while entering the water. The family members were shocked when they did not return home: slippers and clothes were found on the banks of the pond and the first dead body was seen floating. When the three girls did not return home for a long time after noon and were not seen playing nearby, the concern of the families started increasing. The family members started searching for them in the nearby houses, streets and playgrounds. When no trace of them was found inside the village, fearing something untoward, the family along with other villagers reached the banks of Algu pond of the village in search of them. As soon as they reached there, the ground slipped under the feet of the family members, because the clothes and slippers of the three girls were found kept neatly on the banks of Pachari Ghat of the pond. The horror of the situation increased further when a villager standing on the ghat noticed a dead body floating on the surface of the water. The villagers showed promptness and pulled out the body from the water, which was identified as that of 7-year-old Indu Agaria. On seeing Indu's lifeless body, the family members started crying and a crowd of hundreds of villagers gathered near the pond. Quick rescue operation of Pali police: Bodies of Rakhi and Sadhna found after several hours of hard work. Seeing the horror of the incident, Pali police station was immediately informed. As soon as the information was received, Pali police station in-charge Manoj Kaushik reached the spot with his entire police force and divers' resources. After Indu's body was found, fearing that the remaining two girls, Rakhi and Sadhna, might have drowned, the police started an intensive search operation in the deep waters of the pond with the help of local swimmers and villagers. The rescue operation was quite challenging due to the depth of the pond and coldness of the water. Police personnel and villagers searched every part of the water for several hours with the help of nets and ropes. Finally, after tireless efforts, by the evening the divers found the bodies of Rakhi and Sadhna and took them out from the deep mud. Seeing the lifeless bodies of three innocent people from the same colony together, the heart of every villager present shuddered and there was chaos in the entire village. Police established a path and sent the bodies for post-mortem: Need for security on water sources in rural areas. The administrative and police officers present at the spot consoled the family members and, completing the legal process, prepared the Panchnama of the bodies of the three girls. According to Pali police station in-charge Manoj Kaushik, the police have established unnatural death in this tragic case and all three bodies have been sent to the local Community Health Center (CHC) for formal post-mortem. Preliminary medical and police investigations have confirmed death due to drowning due to filling of lungs with water and suffocation. After this horrific accident, local public representatives and administrative officials have expressed deep condolences to the family members and have also appealed to the villagers not to allow small children to go alone near deep ponds, rivers and anicuts during the rainy and summer seasons.
