THATTA: A woman and her three children drowned in the Keenjhar lake in Thatta and two Dawat-i-Islami workers drowned in Channel Mori in Hyderabad on Tuesday.

Sharma Manchri, her two daughters, Sakina, 4, Niamat, 3, and one-month old son, Sodhoro, drowned when a motorboat carrying 14 passengers capsized in the Keenjhar lake after having been buffeted by the wind on Tuesday evening.Some people aboard another motorboat heard the hue and cry of the drowning people and rushed to their rescue. They managed to save 10 persons but the woman and her three children had already died when the rescuers fished them out.

All passengers of the capsized motorboat belonged to the Manchri clan and were returning to their village on the south bank of the lake after visiting a shrine known as Dargah Ameer Pir on the other side of the lake.

In Hyderabad, two youths belonging to the Dawat-i-Islami group drowned while bathing in Channel Mori on Tuesday morning.

The victims were among 10 group members who travelled to Hyderabad from the Kharadar area of Karachi to attend a congregation.

Five of them were bathing in the watercourse and started shouting for help. The divers rescued three of them but the other two, Hamza, son of Mohammed Rafique, and Zeeshan, son of Mohammed Tasleem, both aged between 19 and 24, went missing. Their bodies were fished out on Wednesday morning.

Published in Dawn, November 6th, 2014