Six students living at an orphanage drowned while immersing a Ganesh idol in a pond at Pedda Kanjarla village in Telangana’s Sangareddy district on Wednesday evening.
The incident occurred around 7 pm when the students entered the water during the idol immersion. All six victims were below 20 years of age and were residents of the Siresha Memorial Charitable Trust, which provides shelter to orphaned children.
DCP (Serilingampally Zone) Ch Srinivas identified the deceased as Siddarth, a Class X student; Narasimha Raju, a second-year BTech student; Sumanth Reddy and Ganesh, both second-year polytechnic students; Uday Kiran, a third-year polytechnic student; and Sham Kumar, a first-year polytechnic student.
Cyberabad Police Commissioner M Ramesh Reddy visited the site and reviewed the rescue operation. He said police were still investigating the circumstances surrounding the incident.
“We are yet to find out how the incident happened as the police were immediately involved in rescue efforts. It looks like the boys slipped and drowned in the water body. We will know the actual cause of death later in the night,” he said.
Police said the pond was not an officially designated site for Ganesh idol immersion. An officer pointed out that designated immersion locations are equipped with safety arrangements, including trained swimmers, to respond to emergencies.
A case has been registered under Section 194 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS), which relates to inquiries into suspicious or unnatural deaths.
The deceased students were from Warangal, Kukatpally and Vijayawada in Andhra Pradesh. Police are contacting their families and relatives as further investigation into the incident continues.
