Gurgaon: A nearly 10-hour rescue operation ended in tragedy around 4am on Monday after rescuers pulled out the body of a three-year-old girl who had fallen into a 250-300-foot-deep borewell in Sector 8 on Sunday evening.The victim, Neha, was playing with three other children near the borewell when a bull approached them. The children ran to escape it, and Neha fell into the uncovered opening. The child was trapped at a depth of more than 200 feet, head downward.After she was brought out, she was rushed to a private hospital, where doctors declared her dead. Her body will be sent for postmortem to establish the cause of death.Multiple teams, including police, SDRF, NDRF, municipal corporation and health department, joined the rescue. An NDRF officer said the team was informed around 8pm and reached the spot from Ghaziabad around 9pm, by which time other agencies were already at work.Initially, rescuers could hear Neha crying from inside, but it stopped after some time, raising concern among those at the spot. The municipal corporation estimated the borewell’s depth at around 300 feet. Dirty water had accumulated at around 125 feet, complicating the operation.The equipment brought by the teams could not be used effectively in the narrow shaft, so an improvised tool was prepared at the spot with the help of a local car painter. After several hours, rescuers managed to secure her leg and pull her out. There was no movement in her body at that time.Neha’s friend Shivika, who witnessed the fall, said: “I had bought something from a shop, and she ran towards me. At that time, a bull came from that side. She ran towards the other side to escape from the bull and fell down into the borewell. I saw her fall.”She said the borewell had no proper lid or cover. “We used to play here earlier as well. Bricks had been placed over the borewell, but they had moved and the opening became exposed,” she said.When Neha fell, the children raised the alarm, and neighbours reached the spot and informed her father, Ramdeen.Family member Ruby said she had seen Neha around five minutes earlier. “I went inside to hang clothes to dry, and by then we heard that the girl had fallen. We did whatever came to our mind. We brought sarees from inside and lowered them into the borewell, but they did not reach her. We tied five to six sarees together and also lowered a rope, hoping we could pull her out, but she did not come out,” she said.Ruby said someone informed her of the incident while she was searching nearby, thinking the child might have fallen elsewhere. Police arrived within 15-20 minutes of being informed, she said.“This was sheer negligence. All the gutters and borewells have been left open and they should be covered. A child’s life has already been lost. Now steps must be taken to ensure that such a tragedy does not happen to any other child,” she said.Ruby said the family wanted compensation, as Neha’s parents were poor daily-wage workers struggling to raise their children. Ramdeen, originally from Mainpuri in UP, has lived with his family in Sihi village for several years. He was returning home from work when the incident occurred.An official said the borewell had been closed with a lid around 15 years ago, but the civic body had received no information that the cover had been removed. TOI approached Faridabad municipal corporation commissioner Yashendra Singh, but he did not respond. The department official concerned also did not respond. A senior police officer told TOI that the family had not filed any complaint at the police station.
