Body of missing five-year-old found

Mumbai: Body of a five-year-old boy identified as Saish Marde, who was missing after the immersion at Lalbaugcha Raja was found at shores near Raj Bhavan on Saturday. The boy went missing on the last day of Visarjan at Lalbaugcha Raja during Ganesh Chaturthi, after overturning of a boat led to drowning of five people. In that the unfortunate incident four people were rescued.

Saish had come to Visarjan with his parents and elder sister, who are residents of Palghar. The family got into the boat that was carrying 20 people on board. The boat collided with another at 7.30 am and capsized. The fire-fighters and lifeguards rescued the Marde family and they were rushed to the Nair hospital. While the family believed that Saish was rescued too, it was only later they got to know that the boy was missing.

Later a complaint was filed with the DB Marg police station on Monday. “A missing complaint was filed at the police station and we were on search for the boy. We could not find him even at any of the hospitals. We checked with all the boats that were used during immersions. The CCTV footages of the areas were also scanned,” said Suryakant Banger, senior police inspector, DB Marg police station.

The family suspected that the boy was rescued from the tragedy but was kidnapped from the site, following which they filed a kidnapping case at the police station. The family members even camped outside the police station since Monday.

“We found the boy’s body at the shores near Rajbhavan area at around 11.30 am. We informed the police and the body was sent to JJ hospital. His family was also informed about the same,” said Jagdish Tandel, who spotted the body at the shores.

The grieving father Jayesh Marde, who is a contract worker in Bhabha Atomic Research Centre at Tarapur, took the body to his residence by the evening. “We have suffered a big loss. We are not in a position to speak anything,” he said.