Pune drowning deaths: Grief, anger on a day of funerals

At the Mohammedwadi residence of Swapnali Salgar, 21, her father Shivaji keeps staring at his mobile phone — his daughter had called at 2.52 pm on Monday to say she had reached Murud beach safely. Minutes later, she, along with 13 other college students who had gone for a picnic, drowned in the sea.

“I had packed gajar ka halwa, paranthas and chips for her. I wanted her to enjoy the last year of college. On the way, she told me of her plans to pursue MPhil and PhD. I was thrilled because I can’t even read English and my daughter wanted to study so much,” Salgar says. “At 2.52 pm, she said she had reached and that they were going for a swim. At 7 pm, I heard from neighbours that TV channels were reporting the tragedy. No one had told us anything till then.”

His younger son sobbing quietly by him, Salgar’s voice breaks a little: “Can you imagine how I called people and asked who is bringing my daughter’s body home? I was so shocked I lost my way and wasted two hours. When I reached, my daughter’s body was lying in an ambulance, with no one in attendance.”

In Kondhwa’s Konark Puram, thousands have gathered for the funeral of Iftekar Abbasali Ansari, who died saving two girls. Everyone wants to lend a hand during the funeral procession, and the bewildered family can only watch, unable to handle the crowd. The women of the family watch as the body is taken to Kausarbaug graveyard.

Wiping her tears with a dupatta, Ansari’s sister Ruksaar says, “I wish my brother wasn’t so brave. Had he not saved others, he would be here. He was an expert swimmer; there was no way he would have drowned if he only wanted to save himself. But he wasn’t the selfish kind.”

At the Durrani complex in Mitha Nagar, the Madki family recounts 24 hours that seemed like a lifetime. For, their son, Saif Ahmed Madki, was the “fourteenth victim” whose death was confirmed only on Tuesday morning. Inside the house, the silence is only broken when someone cries out the 20-year-old’s name. A steady stream of visitors keep coming in, each with the same question: “When is the body arriving?”

Minutes before the funeral, Maulana Sayyed Faiyaz says, “If the government officials had come to the last funeral, they would have realised the anger and frustration of people who are upset about their failure to take care of young lives.”

(With inputs from Manoj More)