Bhopal: Even after over 40 hours, there is no trace of 4-year-old child who had fallen into overflowing nullaha at Pansheel Nagar on Tuesday morning. The district administration has pressed over 300 persons in the search operation, however, till Wednesday evening there was no report of the child, who is feared drowned.
Duggu Bansal was playing with his elder brother near his house when he slipped into a nullah which was in full spate due to heavy rains that lashed city. The incident took place at around 11 am on Tuesday. The administration had launched search operation soon after the incident, which continued till late evening.
The teams of Bhopal Municipal Corporation (BMC), police, NDRF and SDERF, are looking for the baby. The search operation was underway near Panchseel Nagar, Ekant Park and Shahpura Lake where the child could have carried away by water current.
The officials of the district administration including collector Sudam P Khade, deputy inspector general Dharmendra Chowdhary (DIG) and commissioner of the BMC Avinash Lavania have visited the spots to take stock of the search operation.
The search was put on halt at 9 on Tuesday night and resumed in the morning around 6 am after which the divers of the BMC, NDRF, SDREF and police kept searching the boy but to no avail. The teams are now clearing garbage and waste from nullaha as it is suspected that the boy could have been stuck in it.
Meanwhile, leader of opposition in the BMC Mohammad Sageer when contacted said that an FIR should be lodged against Mayor Alok Sharma, chairman Surjeet Singh Chouhan and commissioner. Sageer has shot off a letter to the collector stating that the Congress corporators have time and again demanded cleaning and declogging of nullahas and drains in the city which went unheard and now a child has lost his life due to the negligence of officials and representatives of the civic body.
He said that in the year 2006, total 6 persons had lost lives but till date no concrete plan has been formulated for undertaking up cleanliness of the nullahas, resulting in loss of a precious life. The mayor is ultimately responsible for the tragic incident as if these nullahas were cleaned before, this would never had happened, he said while talking to the Free Press.
