About 20 people, including a 7-year-old girl and seven women, had a close shave from drowning on Thursday even as a country boat carrying them capsized in luna river near Gobardhanpur ghat at Karanja under Marshaghai police station in Kendrapada district.
According to Marshaghai PS IIC Sukant Kumar Patra, a rickety country boat carrying about 20 persons, five motorbikes and seven cycles from Balana ghat was ferrying on luna river to Gobardhanpur ghat when the incident occurred. The boat capsized in the middle of the river as a wooden plank was broken. While several persons managed to swim to the river bank safely, others were rescued by locals. Though all were saved, yet two women and a girl child became sick. They were rushed to the Marshaghai CHC for treatment.
The sick were identified as Basanti Nauri(40), Rashmita Nauri (7) and Sarala Rout (45). While Basanti and Rashmita were discharged after getting first aid, Sarala was still undergoing treatment. Some of the motorbikes and cycles have been brought out from river by fire personnel and local boatmen, informed the IIC.
If official sources are to be believed, the ramshackle country boat was ferrying without a valid licence.
Mahakalpada Tehsildar Nilamadhab Bhoi lodged an FIR at Marshaghai police station against the boatman, Kalpataru Rout. The police too interrogated Kalpataru and his father Ghanashyam Rout.