HYDERABAD, Feb 27: A tenage girl died after falling into an open drain of the Water and Sanitation Agency in the SITE area here on Friday.
The mentally-retarded girl, Sonya, 14, daughter of Faqira, had left her house in Kali Mata temple in the union council-16 area on Thursday night and since then she had been missing.
A resident of the area told her family members that she had seen something falling in the drain passing through the area. The family mounted a search with the help of some drivers who recovered Sonya's body from the open drain.
Latifabad Taluka Nazim Abdul Jabbar Khan and Wasa managing director M. Tahir arrived in the area and the Nazim gave Rs5,000 to the grieved family for the funeral. Expressing his anger over the incident, the Nazim said that similar incidents had recently occurred in Hyderabad but the Wasa authorities had failed to cover open drains.
WASA: The Wasa chief conceded that the 25-year old drain had outlived its designed age. He told this correspondent that the drain was basically meant for disposing of industrial waste but none of the area industries had ever contributed a single penny towards its repair.
Mr Tahir said that walls of the drain were quite weak and they could not afford any roof over them, adding that in case of covering it with a roof, chances of casualties would increase as people would pass on it.
He admitted that it was the third incident of a death caused by open drain in the city in recent past. Earlier a 2-year-old boy, Osama, son of, Imran drowned in an open drain in Latifabad-12 that had led to violence the area.
In another incident on the eve of Eid-ul Azha, 5-year-old Aisha Gulzameen drowned in another open drain. Following her death the SITE police registered a case against Wasa SDO Saleem Siddiqui and sub-engineer Aleemuddin on the police complaint under section 319, Qisas and Diyat Ordinance.
The Wasa officials approached the police authorities and an investigation was ordered whose report recommended that drains should be covered. The matter is still pending with the police.