Anil Bediya, one of the 41 labourers who were rescued from a collapsed Uttarakhand tunnel after 17 days, survived the ordeal by eating ‘muri’ (puffed rice) and licking water dripping from rocks. The 22-year-old worker hailing from Jharkhand had a close brush with death after a portion of the Silkyara tunnel on the Brahmakhal-Yamunotri national highway in Uttarakhand collapsed early on November 12.

“Loud shrieks punctuated the air...We all thought we would be buried inside the tunnel and had lost all hope during the first couple of days,” Bediya told PTI over the phone from Uttarakhand on Wednesday while narrating their harrowing tale. “It was a nightmarish ordeal...we licked water dripping from rocks to quench our thirst and survived on muri for the first 10 days,” Bediya, who is now recuperating at a Uttarakhand hospital, said.