KARACHI: Two sisters, aged 10 and 14 years, drowned in the Malir river near Bismia Goth on Tuesday afternoon, police and charity volunteers said.

Though the town administration and rescue service of the local government authorities initially remained unaware of the incident, the volunteers of the charity service took more than an hour to fish out the bodies of the victims, identified as Ansa Bano and Salma Bano, daughters of Deen Muhammad.

“Ansa was 10 years old,” said an official at the Shah Latif police station. “The search for the other girl took more time since the charity service did not have the required resource. After over an hour they managed to find the body of Salma and shifted both to the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Center. The victims’ family lives in the nearby Bismia Goth.”

In the other incident, a three-year-old girl drowned in the Lyari river near Quba Masjid.

An official at the Docks police station said that the body of the girl identified as Hina, daughter of Rehmat, was taken to the Ruth Pfau Civil Hospital Karachi. The girl drowned in the river while playing near its bank and the other children with her finding them helpless informed area people and her family but it was too late, he added.

Published in Dawn, August 21st, 2019