14 students on picnic drown in sea

At least 14 students from Pune who were on a picnic drowned off Murud beach along the Konkan coast in Raigad district on Monday. While 13 bodies have been retrieved and identified, one student is still missing and is presumed dead.

Six students have been saved and they are now receiving treatment at local hospitals. The victims include 10 girls. At the time of going to the press, the Raigad Police, zilla parishad authorities and local fishermen, besides the Navy and Coast Guard were still involved in the search and rescue operation.

The students were from Maharashtra Cosmopolitan Education Society’s (MCES) Abeda Inamdar Senior College of Arts, Science and Commerce of the famous Azam Campus in Camp area of Pune.

“The initial information that we have is that the students were caught in the tide,” said Prashant Burde, IGP (Konkan range).  The students had reached Raigad in three buses around 2 pm and they hit the beach  around 3 pm.

Burde said that there were a total of 115 students – 60 boys and 55 girls – aged between 18 and 23 years. They were accompanied by 11 teachers and 11 support staff from the college. The students were from the first, second and third year BSc (Computer Science) and BCA (Computer Applications).

“At least five to six students were rescued,” said Dilip Yadav, Naib Tehsildar of Murud. “As soon as we came to know of it, we also activated our network and 10 ambulances were dispatched along with trustees and staff,” said P A Inamdar, MCES president.

Inamdar, however, said the information he has received is that there was no lifeguard at the site when the incident occurred. “We are shocked. We are shocked by this tragedy. We are making all efforts to help the students and their families,” he added. Thousands of tourists and locals gathered at the Murud beach where bodies were lined up even as grieving parents and stunned relatives rushed to the college campus.