Kerala engineer goes missing from ONGC rig off Mumbai, kin allege murder
The police have learnt that the engineer Enos Varghese, 26, who hails from Adoor in Kerala, was on the ONGC's rig at an offshore installation when he allegedly fell into the water and disappeared.
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Mumbai police have initiated an investigation into the suspicious disappearance of an electrical engineer who was employed on a contract basis with the ONGC. (Representational image via Unsplash) The Yellow Gate police in Mumbai have initiated an investigation into the suspicious disappearance of an electrical engineer who was employed on a contract basis with the Oil And Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC). The man’s family has, however, alleged that his co-workers are trying to cover up his murder and “portray the incident as a suicide attempt”.
As per the preliminary inquiry, the police have learnt that the engineer Enos Varghese, 26, who hails from Adoor in Kerala’s Pathanamthitta district, was on the ONGC’s rig at an offshore installation when he allegedly fell into the water and disappeared. The police initiated a probe after ONGC officials lodged a missing report on Saturday.
Assistant Commissioner of Police Nitin Mansing Bobade (Yellow Gate division) said, “We have been told that on Friday he suddenly fell into the water while working. The people who were present on the rig even threw a safety wheel towards him, but he could not catch hold of it and allegedly drowned.”
The Yellow Gate police have not confirmed his death so far. They, however, sent a team to the rig on Tuesday to record the statements of the workers and ascertain the facts behind the incident. “We have also asked for the footage from the CCTV camera installed there,” said an officer. The team is yet to return.
Employed with a Gujarat-based company, Enos was set to return to Vadodara after completing the assignment with the ONGC.
Meanwhile, his father Reji Varghese alleged that “the ONGC was trying to portray the incident as a suicide attempt”.
“I firmly believe that my son was murdered,” the former service personnel told The Indian Express on Tuesday. Reji, who reached Mumbai along with a few relatives, said, “Enos sounded happy when he called us [his parents] on Friday afternoon. We don’t know what happened after that. He sent Skype messages to his friends saying that his life was in danger and that if he went missing, these messages would let the world know foul play was involved. He messaged his friend Ajith S, who works with him in Gujarat, saying he would tell him everything in detail once he boarded the train to Vadodara.”
Meanwhile, Enos’s cousin Jaison, who is in Mumbai with Reji, said the missing man was at the rig with a colleague from Vadodara. Jaison added that the family suspects the colleague in connection with Enos’s disappearance.
“Since calls were not possible from the rig, Enos was chatting with a friend from his colleague’s Skype account. In the chats, he said he needed to escape from the place immediately as he feared that his colleague was a murderer. In a chat sent around 8.13 pm, the colleague informed his friend that Enos had jumped into the sea,” said Jaison.
Reji added, “No one can claim that Enos would die by suicide. He was very religious. I met some people from the ONGC and they tried to convince me that he had attempted suicide. When we showed them the [Skype] messages, they realised that we did not believe their version.”
“I need my son, dead or alive. Whatever happened to him, it is for the police to find out. The Navy and Coast Guard are searching for him. We hope to find an answer soon,” said Reji.
With inputs from ENS, Kochi
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