Warden knew risks, still sent 8 students into Telangana lake for idol immersion, 6 drowned

HYDERABAD: A day after six inmates of Sirisha Memorial Charitable Trust drowned during Ganesh idol immersion at Pedda Kancharla lake in Patancheru, on Hyderabad’s outskirts, police arrested the hostel warden following demands from the victims’ families for strict action against him.During the investigation, police found that the warden, 53-year-old Varanasi Jay Prakash Rao, had taken the students to the lake for the immersion and directed them to enter the water. “He knew about the danger of sending them into the water and yet allowed them to go ahead, without taking any precautionary measures. The boys eventually drowned,” said an official of Patancheru police.At 8 am on Thursday, Rao was taken into custody and subsequently arrested under Section 105 (culpable homicide not amounting to murder) of the BNS. Patancheru inspector M Ravinder told TOI that the accused was produced before a magistrate and later sent to judicial remand.Meanwhile, the postmortem examination of the six deceased — G Narasimha Raju, 22, A Uday Kiran, 18, R Ganesh, 19, B Sumanth Reddy, S Shyam Kumar, 17, and N Siddharth, 16 — was conducted at a local hospital amid tight security.The tragic incident, police said, occurred a little after 5.30pm on Wednesday when 15 boys from the charitable trust-run hostel reached Pedda Kancharla lake for immersion. The mood was celebratory and the boys eagerly carried the idol to the lake, even as the warden waited near the tractor that had transported the idol from the hostel to the immersion site.“Initially, eight boys got into the water with the idol. When one of them started to drown, he held the hand of another boy in an attempt to save himself. But instead, all of them lost their balance and fell into the water along with the idol,” said a class 8 student who was present at the site. He added: “While two of them eventually managed to come out safely, the six others drowned.”Alerted by students waiting on the lake shore, some hostel staff and locals rushed to the site and retrieved the bodies from the water. Eyewitnesses said an ambulance and police reached the spot nearly an hour later.Police initially believed that the deceased were orphans but later learnt that they were not. The hostel also housed children who were in the care of single parents and those from financially weaker families.“These six boys belonged to different parts of Telangana and AP and had been living at the hostel since many years. On receiving the news, their family members rushed to Patancheru late on Wednesday night and demanded action against Rao for his alleged negligence in allowing the students to enter the water,” said a source.You Can Also Check: Gold Rate in Hyderabad | Silver Rate in Hyderabad | Bank Holidays in Hyderabad | Public Holidays in Hyderabad | Hyderabad AQI | Weather in Hyderabad | Petrol Price in Hyderabad | Diesel Price in Hyderabad | CNG Price in Hyderabad | LPG Price in HyderabadStay updated with the latest Hyderabad news. Download the TOI App.