Umaria/Chhatarpur (Madhya Pradesh): The officials of the district administration of Chhatarpur and those of Umaria have carried out two breath-taking operations to rescue two kids from bore-wells.
The times were different. So were the places. And so were the results. There is one thing similar, however. The fathers of both the children dug up the bore-wells and left them uncovered.
In the first incident, a one and a half years old girl Divyanshi fell into a 20-foot-deep bore-well in Dauni village of Chattarpur district on December 16 last year.
The administration with the help of the Disaster Management Team launched an all-out rescue operation to pull out the girl.
It was biting cold. Yet the operation continued. Oxygen was provided to her through an 18-foot-deep bore done by the rescue team with machines. Every bit of information was taken through CCTV cameras. Then, the rescuers cried out in joy: Hurrah! It is done! The girl was alive, hale and hearty!
The second rescue operation was carried out in joy: Hurrah! The girl is alive, hale and hearty.
A similar operation was carried out in Badarchhad village in Umaria district. A three-year-old boy Gaurav Dwivedi fell into a 200-foot-deep bore-well.
The rescue operation continued for 17 hours. The rescuers – officials of the district administration, the police and those of the State Disaster Emergency force – swung into action.
They pumped oxygen into the borewell. Yet, by the time they reached the boy, he breathed his last.
The rescuers rushed Gaurav to a Primary Health Centre with all the life support. Dr Rajmani Patel at the health centre declared him dead.
Dr Patel said that the boy had fallen into the well upside down and stuck at 20 feet depth where water existed.
According to Dr Patel, the boy could not take breath as his head was in the water; it was a case of drowning.
The boy fell into the borewell after a toy mobile phone dropped into it from his hand. As he peeped into the deathtrap, he too slipped into it.
As long as the operation continued, the residents of Badarchhad village prayed for the survival of the boy.
At the crack of dawn, when Gaurav’s lifeless body was pulled out, a miasma of despair descended on the village. The rescuers, too, were sad. All of them paid a tribute to the boy.
Whose fault?
In both cases, there is one thing in common: fathers of both the children dug the borewells and left them uncovered. The father of Gaurav, Bhola Dubey, dug the borewell in Badarchhad village, Umaria. Similarly, the father of Divyanshi, Rejendra Kushwaha, dug the borewell in Dauni village, Chhatarpur, villagers said.
Meanwhile, the officials of the district administration appealed to people to cover the borewells after digging them.
(With input from Santosh Kumar Dwivedi and Laxmi Narayan Sharma)
