HYDERABAD: Three girls died after falling into a 30-foot-deep open water body that was dug up for constructing an apartment at KPHB Fourth Phase. The parents of the three deceased girls are daily labourers who live nearby. The incident occurred on Friday afternoon when five girls went to play near the man-made pond.
The five girls were playing a cooking game. As part of their game, three girls Ramya, 7, Sangeetha, 12, and Sofia, 10, went close to the pit to fetch some water when they accidentally slipped and fell.
The other two girls who witnessed the fall were terrified and did not inform the adults right away. The families were informed 30 to 40 minutes afterwards when the girls noticed Ramya’s body floating in the water. The parents then called the police who rushed to the spot and retrieved Ramya’s body. Around 30-35 personnel from NDRF, DRF and the police department joined hands for the search operation which lasted five hours. The teams then brought out the bodies of Sangeetha and Sofia.
The 30-foot-deep pond was dug and filled with water to the brim to construct an apartment in the year 2013. The land belongs to the Housing Board and the construction work was halted abruptly. While police officials say the pond had a fence, media personnel who went there did not find any protective set-up around the massive pond.
The teary-eyed families said they were in shock since they had warned their children several times not to go near the pond. Ramya’s family hails from Uttar Pradesh, Sangeetha’s from Bihar, while Sofia’s parents are from Mahbubnagar. The bodies were moved to Gandhi Hospital for post-mortem. Earlier too, two boys died in the same water body, one in 2013 and another in 2015.