Five members of a family including the newlywed woman drowned in the Shalmala river near Sirsi in Uttara Kannada district of coastal Karnataka during a post-wedding picnic on Sunday, December 17.
The deceased are Maulana Hafiz Muhammed Saleem Khalilur Rehman (44), his son Umar Siddique (14), Maulana’s sister’s son Nabil Noor Ahmad Shaikh (22), Maulana’s sister’s daughter Nadiya Noor Ahmad Shaikh (20), and Maulana's brother's daughter Misbah Tabussum (21).
According to police, one of the deceased Nadiya was married to a man from Hassan two weeks ago and the family had arranged a picnic-cum-party at Bhootanagundi on the Shalmala riverbed for the groom’s family who came from Hassan.
At around 3 p.m., Maulana Saleem's 5-year-old daughter, who was playing near the river, accidentally fell into river. Maulana Saleem immediately jumped into the river and save her. However, in the process, he got exhausted, and failed to get out of the river.
Witnessing this, seven family members entered the river to rescue him. But all of them got trapped in the water. Five of them drowned trying to save each other. Three others were rescued.
A police officer said none of the victims knew how to swim, and all of them jumped into the water to save one another.
Bodies of five victims were retrieved after a joint effort by local youth, fishermen, and fire brigade personnel. After conducting post-mortem at Sirsi Government Hospital, the bodies were handed over to the family.
A case has been registered at Sirsi rural police station and investigations are on.
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