Valsad (Gujarat), Sep 22 A one-and-a-half-year-old boy went missing after a boat carrying around ten members of the fishermen community capsized in a river in Gujarat’s Valsad on Tuesday during a religious ritual, police said.
The incident occurred around 10.30 am, they said.
Members of the fishermen community from Umarsadi village in Valsad were travelling by boat for the religious ritual in Par river, inspector Y B Gohil told PTI.
The boat stopped midway in the river due to an obstruction, suspected to be a rope, and subsequently capsized, he said.
At the time, the one-and-a-half-year-old boy, who was sitting on the lap of a passenger, fell into the river, Gohil said.
“Since all the passengers belonged to the fishermen community, they managed to swim to the shore. But the boy went missing and a search for him is underway,” he said.
Teams of the fire department, police, local divers and the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF) are conducting the search operation, the inspector said.
Gohil said the incident occurred during an annual religious ritual in which members of the fishermen community carry idols of Laxmi Narayan and perform puja, bathe them at the confluence of the river and the sea, before setting out for fishing.
(PTI News)
