MANAPPARAI: When Sujith Wilson's father talked to his trapped son and the two-year-old responded with a cry, it broke the hearts of hundreds of people gathered around the borewell in Manapparai.
Situated between scenic hills and boasting of lush farmlands, Nadukkattupatti is usually a quiet village. However, on Friday night when the news of the boy falling into an open borewell spread, vehicles with beaming headlights and sirens could be found along the road leading to the village from Manapparai.
Inside the borewell was relative darkness.
Even before rescue officials arrived, the locals themselves arranged a camera with light and dropped it inside the borewell. Sujith at that moment was 27 feet away. When the villagers saw him on the monitor, they thought he could be rescued easily by the experts.
However, with continuous rescue attempts failing, fear set in.
The boy reportedly fell with his hands above his head. On the monitor, he could clearly be seen moving his hands.
By this time, several hundreds of onlookers, tired of watching updates on television, had thronged the village to get a first-hand account for themselves.
Before the experts arrived, the rescue officials arranged to dig a parallel pit close to the borewell with an aim to rescue the boy. There were five earthmovers at work. Incidentally, the borewell was located in the midst of a maize field and it was hardly 30 feet away from the boy’s house.
His relatives lamented, "The boy was always playing in the maize field and used to visit his uncle's house through this portion of the field only." They wondered where the borewell had suddenly emerged from.
Later it was learnt that the unused borewell was closed at least five years ago using a cement slab. However, the recent downpours in the village had led to the sand under the slab dissolving. This had displaced it and exposed the opening. As the place was covered with maize crops, this sadly had not been noticed. Until that is the toddler tragically slipped and fell.
The people, who gathered at the spot, were discussing this. Almost all of them felt in their hearts that the boy could be rescued in an hour or two. As the news flashed on news channels, the crowd started to grow.
Experts, with an array of different equipments from elsewhere in the state, rushed to the spot. Several methods using various equipments were tried but in vain.
Each time the experts got hold of the boy's hands using knots or their equipment, there was a gleam of hope on everyone's faces. A few of them even showed the thumbs up symbol after watching these developments on the monitor. But as these efforts failed, sadness set in.
Muniyandi of Melamanjampatti said, "As soon as I heard of the news, I rushed to the spot. People there told me that the boy was just 27 feet deep and experts could save him. So I decided to wait there to see that. But I had to return home by 3 am with disappointment."
He might have left but many others kept waiting around the borewell in the hope of getting a glimpse of Sujith.
"We couldn't just hold our nerves sitting in our houses. It is very tragic that something of this sort has happened. I just hope no one else goes through this," said Thamizharasan, who came all the way from Pudukkottai, to watch the rescue.
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With the presence of the crowd starting to hamper the rescue, the police raised checkpoints, tied ropes, placed homeguards, but the people who wanted to see Sujith come out alive refused to let that come in their way.
"Yes, the police have made us walk for 2 kms. But so what? He is a child of our land and we are concerned about him. No one can stop us from caring for Sujith," said Anbusundaram, a resident of Manjampatti.