A day after the boat disaster off the Gateway of India that claimed 13 lives, the ships and aircraft of the Indian Navy and Indian Coast Guard on Thursday continued their search for two persons – an adult male and a male child – who went missing after a Navy speed boat collided with a passenger ferry in the Arabian Sea.
Within hours after the boat tragedy, the Indian Navy set up a Board of Inquiry into the mishap to establish the circumstances leading to the mid-sea collision and to fix the responsibility.
Of the 113 persons on board both the vessels, 13 persons drowned while 98 others, including two injured, were rescued, after a Navy speed boat undergoing engine trials lost control and collided with a passenger ferry Neel Kamal off Karanja, Mumbai at 4 pm on Thursday. The ferry was carrying passengers from Gateway of India to Elephanta Island at the time of mishap.
The two missing passengers have been identified as 43-year-old Hansraj Bhati and seven-year-old Johan Mohammad Nisar Ahmed Pathan.
A defence official said that Indian Navy nd the Coast Guard deployed their vessels and their helicopters to search the two persons who were thrown into the waters after the mid-sea collision between a naval speed boat and a ferry in the water channel near the tiny Butcher Island oil terminal, 5 km from the Gateway of India
“Search and rescue efforts have continued throughout the intervening night of Wednesday and Thursday in the vicinity of the accident. Search and rescue operations are in progress by eight Navy craft, a naval helicopter and a Coast Guard vessel to search for the two missing persons,” a defence spokesperson said.
The rescued persons are still in different hospitals of Mumbai and Raigad district. While the condition of 100 is now stable.
Official sources said that 57 survivors are currently in JNPA Hospital, 24 in Naval Dockyard medical facility, 13 in INHS Sanghani (Karanja), 10 in St. George Hospital, 12 in a hospital on the mainland at Karanja and one in INHS Ashvini Hospital. Eight survivors who recovered have been discharged from different hospitals.
All the persons killed in the boat disaster have been identified. Of those 13 killed in the boat tragedy, there were two minors Nidhish Rakesh Ahire ( 8 year-old boy from Nashik), Mahi Sairam Pavra ( 3-year-old girl from Dhule), five women -- Harshada Rakesh Ahire ( 31 years, Nashik), Shafina Ashraf Pathan (34 years from Goa), Rama Ratidevi Gupta (50 years from Palghar) and Pragnya Vinod Kamble ( 39 years from Navi Mumbai).
Meanwhile, acting on a complaint lodged by survivor Natharam Chaudhary, the Colaba police have registered an FIR under sections 106(1), 125 (a) (b), 282, 324 (3)(5) of Bharatiya Nyay Sanhita has been registered in Colaba police station against people responsible for the tragedy.
