KAARCHI: Jan 25: Three young labourers died of suffocation while working in an underground water tank in Mehmoodabad on Wednesday, police and charity volunteers said.The police, blaming human negligence for the deaths, argued that registration of a criminal case was not required.

They said that an abandoned bungalow in Parsi Colony near Mehmoodabad was under renovation and several labourers were engaged in different tasks. “One of them, Akhtar, carrying a power generator descended into the underground water tank. He started it to make some lighting arrangements for cleaning the tank,” said an official at the Mehmoodabad police station.

“Within a few minutes, fumes from the generator filled the tank and caused him to fall unconscious. Two co-workers, Zafar (a carpenter) and Amir (a watchman), rushed to his rescue and descended into the tank but could not come out.

“The situation alarmed the other people present in the bungalow and they called the area police and Edhi volunteers,” said the official.

The police and volunteers managed to bring the three labourers out of the tank, he said.

An Edhi official said that Akhtar had already died when he was taken out of the tank. Zafar and Amir were rushed to the Jinnah Postgraduate Medical Centre but they died during treatment, he added.

“The rescuers had to wear masks and carry oxygen as the thick smoke that filled the tank had made breathing impossible,” the police official said.