Thane: No trace of baby girl which fell into creek; search stopped

Pic/PTI

The search for a four-month-old girl which fell into a creek in Thane district was stopped on Thursday evening as the child remained untraceable, an official told news agency PTI.

Teams of the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) and Kalyan-Dombivli fire brigade searched the Ulhas river and creek as far as Mumbra but in vain, he said.

Kalyan tehsildar Jairaj Deshmukh told PTI that the search operations were stopped after darkness fell. "Tomorrow we will take a decision on further search," the official told PTI.

The girl's mother and grandfather were returning to Bhiwandi after taking her to a hospital in Mumbai when the incident took place on Wednesday.

As the train stopped between Thakurli and Kalyan stations amid heavy rains, the father and daughter got down on the tracks and started walking, a police official told PTI.

The baby girl slipped from her grandfather's hands and fell into the creek below, he said.

Meanwhile, in Bhiwandi city of Thane district, a 14-year-old girl drowned in a swollen drain while her 12-year-old brother was rescued by people, a civic official told PTI.

The incident occurred in the afternoon when the brother-sister duo was walking home after attending school, the official said.

The body of the girl was fished out from the water later, the official said.

In another incident, the body of a milk delivery man was found in the duct of a lift in a residential building in the Mumbra area of Thane city on Tuesday, civic officials told PTI.

The victim was identified as Jatashankar Pal (45) and his body was found at around 8.30 pm, they said.

Chief of Disaster Management Cell of the Thane Municipal Corporation (TMC) Yasin Tadvi told PTI that the milk delivery man had gone to the building, Jarina Apartments, at around 9.30 am.

Pal accidentally fell into the duct and died, he said.

Local firemen and Regional Disaster Management Cell (RDMC) personnel later retrieved the body from the duct, said Tadvi.

The Mumbra police have registered a case of accidental death and are probing the matter.

(With inputs from PTI)