Mangalore: Two youngsters drown in standing quarry water

Daijiworld Media Network – Mangalore (SP)

Mangalore, Jun 10: Manjunath (5), son of Sekabba and Saroja, and Rajendra (13), son of Dada Saheb-Suma couple, lost their lives due to drowning on Sunday June 9.

The parents of the boys hail from Belgaum district, and reside in a cluster of houses inhabited by migrant labourers from North Karnataka at Kayarpadavu in Ulaibettu village near here.

A number of elders from the area were on a visit to the city to buy things they needed, as Sunday happens to be a holiday. Some children from the locality were playing in the area, when Manjunath reportedly began playing in the standing water of a stone quarry nearby. Soon, his legs got buried in the slush and sediment deposited at the bottom of the water, and he began drowning. Rajendra, who was playing nearby, rushed to Manjunath’s rescue, but he too got stuck, and drowned.

It is said that the stone quarry where the children drowned used to be very vast in the past, but of late, quarrying work has been suspended, and the pit is being filled with soil. Only a tiny pit remained to be filled, and the children lost their lives in this pit. The pit normally remained dry, but because of recent rains, it was filled to the brim with water.

The other children saw their friends drowning, and raised an alarm. The elders rushed to the spot, but it was too late. Manuunath was a student of St Antony’s School in Madriyanagar in Mallur, while Rajendra studied at the government school in Bodantila.

The bodies were shifted to Wenlock Hospital for post mortem.  A case was registered in the city rural police station.