Kochi, Oct 1 (Inditop.com) With the recovery of 11 more bodies Thursday from the Thekkady lake at the Periyar Wildlife Sanctuary in central Kerala, the toll in Wednesday’s boat tragedy has touched 42, government officials said.
The tragedy occurred Wednesday at 5.15 p.m. when the boat carrying 76 tourists capsized in one of the deepest reservoirs of the Mullaperiyar dam in Idduki district.
An official manning the control room at the accident site told Inditop: “From our records, we have identified that 12 (victims) were from Delhi, five from West Bengal, four from Andhra Pradesh, three from Karnataka and one from Mumbai. Five more bodies are there and we are trying to identify them.,”
A 24 member diving team of the Indian Navy reached the accident site Thursday morning to search for the bodies.
The official said that around a dozen bodies were taken to Tamil Nadu by road, while two bodies were flown to Hyderabad from here Thursday evening.
The district administration here have made arrangements with the hospitals to embalm the bodies.
Ernakulam District Collector M. Beena said: “Due to the delay in the arrival of bodies from the accident site, it is not possible to airlift the bodies today (Thursday), even though we had made all the arrangements. We will now airlift the remaining bodies tomorrow (Friday).”
P.T. Thomas, Idduki Lok Sabha MP, told Inditop over telephone from Kumily, near Thekkady:
“There were four foreigners in the boat. Two women and two children. All of them are from Cape Town, South Africa. I met them in the Kumily Central Hospital yesterday (Wednesday) night. They are safe.”
Meanwhile, Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan told reporters in Thiruvananthapuram that the state government would bear all transport expenses of the victims as well as the expenses incurred by the rescued tourists.
“We will hold a judicial inquiry (into the incident) by a sitting judge of the Kerala High Court. We have also decided to sanction an ex-gratia of Rs.5 lakh each to the families of the deceased,” said Achuthanandan.
