MANGALURU: Three engineering students from Mysuru drowned in a swimming pool of a private beach resort at Ullal police station limits near Mangaluru on Sunday.
The deceased are identified as N Keerthana (21), daughter of S Naveen Kumar from Devaraj Mohalla in Vijayanagara, M D Nishitha (21), daughter of Mallesh from Kurubarahalli and S Parvathi (20) daughter of M N Srinivas from K R Mohalla.
According to Ullal police, the incident took place at Vazco beach resort at Peribail near Batapady in Someshwar village at around 10.5am on Sunday.
Mangaluru city police commissioner Anupam Agrawal who visited the spot told media persons that three friends had entered the swimming pool at around 10 am.
"One of the women strayed into the deeper side of the pool and drowned. Two other friends drowned while trying to save each other. All of them did not know how to swim and eventually drowned," he said.
Sources said they had booked the resort online for the weekend and checked into the resort on Saturday.
Meanwhile, the CCTV footage from the resort has gone viral. The trio is seen entering the pool, trying to catch hold of a safety ring kept in the deeper side of the pool. One of the women who goes to the deeper side, cries for help. Two other women rush to help and get drowned after a long struggle to swim back to the safe end.
"Through the CCTV footage, we have come to know neither there was staff around for rescue nor any safety items were available at the pool. There was no lifeguard and there was no mention of the depth. We have taken the resort owner Manohar into custody and are further investigation is on. The bodies have been shifted to district Wenlock hospital for post-mortem," the police commissioner said.