5-year-old dies after falling into borewell. BJP MLA blames parents

The girl, Shivani, went missing from her home in Hari Singh Pura village in Karnal on Sunday afternoon. Around 9 pm, her family learned she fell into a 50-feet-deep borewell.

Villagers immediately informed the police, and cops along with NDRF teams got to work.

Around 9:30 am today, she was pulled out and rushed to Karnal's civil hospital where doctors declared her "brought dead".

The rescue team sent oxygen to Shivani inside the borewell and used a camera to track her movements. They were only able to see her foot.

A voice recording of her parents was also played to calm her.

Dr. Ashwani Ahuja of the hospital said, "Dr. Manish Goyal was also there to monitor at night."

Tragically, the efforts didn't pay off.

Shivani's death comes close to the heels of Sujith Wilson's demise in Tamil Nadu.

Efforts to save the toddler in Tamil Nadu's Tiruchirappalli carried on for more than 80 hours but by the end of it, all officials managed to retrieve was his decomposed body.

Ironically, poor planning by rescue staff caused Wilson to slip further, raising concerns about the team's efficiency.

When Wilson fell into borewell, politicians expressed "concern" and after his death "shared" the family's grief.

But every time such an incident surfaces, it reflects the government's laxity. The first accident which caught India's attention was in 2006 when four-year-old Prince fell into borewell.

The entire nation watched his rescue operations with hope, but 13 years later, the surge in accidents show nothing has changed.

Citing reports, NDRF once asserted that since 2009, more than 40 children fell into the borewell. In 70% of cases, the rescue operations failed.

In Tamil Nadu alone, 10 children died in the last 15 years after they fell into suffocating borewells, reports PTI.

In 2010, the Supreme Court framed guidelines to prevent such mishaps.

But almost a decade later, things are still the same.

According to experts, rescue operations depend on several factors, like the type of soil.

"In places like Rajasthan and Haryana, soil tends to be loose and sandy, making it more susceptible to collapse. In hillier regions, where the soil is rocky, drilling requires heavy machinery and is much harder to do," assistant commandant of the NDRF, Krishan Kumar, was quoted by ThePrint earlier.

Considering the rise in incidents, NDRF started using improvised devices to rescue kids. These include employing an "umbrella-like device" or tying a rope around the victim.

While NDRF tailors its technique for each incident, the team will not be pressed to service if abandoned borewells are covered.

None of the successive governments give proper attention to borewells, and that's nothing but a national tragedy.