About 20 people including children remained missing after a boat they were travelling in capsized at Kalahi River, a tributary of Brahmaputra River, near Chaigaon in Assam’s Kamrup district on Monday.
The incident took place at Sampupara area in Kamrup district. The people travelling in the capsized boat were on their way to enjoy a traditional boat race at Gomi in Kamrup district.
Kamrup Deputy Commissioner (DC) Vinod Seshan rushed to the area to supervise the rescue operation immediately. “We have deployed the NDRF and SDRF jawans immediately. The local people have also been assisting in the rescue operations,” said Seshan.
“The locals said the boat was travelling from Hatikhola to Gomi. They were sailing against the stream and the engine of the machine boat failed after reaching the Sampupara area. According to the estimate of the locals, there were about 200 people in the boat when it hit some object in the middle of the river and capsized,” he said.
While some people jumped into the river and swam across, locals believe that many, including women and children got trapped under the capsised boat.
“The locals said there were women and children in the boat. However, we are yet to recover any body so far. We hope that the missing are also safe,” said the DC while adding that the District Administration was yet to receive ant missing intimation so far. The incident, however, came as a reminder of the boat tragedy on the Brahmaputra River in May 2012 where over 40 people including women and children were killed. The 2012 tragedy took place due to the Government’s failure to check the violation of guidelines by the ferry and machine boat operators — who often sail without life jackets and often carry more passengers than the capacity of the boat.