out of borewell
\nManesar District (Haryana), June 24 (MNS\/ANI): Lifeless body of four-year-old Mahi was pulled out of a nearly 70-foot deep borewell on Sunday afternoon, over 80 hours after falling into it.
\nArmy soldiers who were involved in the rescue effort along with staff of other agencies, pulled Mahi out of the borewell a little after 1.40 p.m. on Sunday.
\n\u201cMahi has been pulled out from the borewell… she is dead,\u201d Gurgaon District Magistrate PC Meena\u00a0said.
\nThe efforts to save five-year-old Mahi Upadhyay were televised live by national news channels, with people across the country performing religious rituals and offering prayers for her survival.
\nThe girl fell down the well on June 20 while playing with her friends in a village in Harayana state, about 50 kilometres southwest of New Delhi.
\nHundreds of soldiers, engineers and medical experts were involved in the attempt to rescue her, using heavy machinery to dig a parallel tunnel to reach her as well as pumping oxygen into the well to try to keep her alive.
\nHer body was carried out on Sunday wrapped in a blanket and taken to a nearby hospital where doctors declared her dead.
\n\u201cMahi was stuck at a level of 60 feet (20 metres). The diameter of the well was very narrow, nothing could be sent inside to save her,\u201d senior police officer Anil Rao told reporters at the scene.
\nGurgaon officials said she was dead even before soldiers who had been working non-stop for days finally made contact with the child just afternoon.
\nBacking the military was a group of men adept in digging tunnels and borewells led by a Saurav Khan.
\nThe news shattered the thousands of people who had gathered outside the hospital and at the site of the borewell for days, hoping and praying that the girl would somehow survive.
\nThe girl\u2019s mother broke down on hearing that her daughter was no more.
\nWhen soldiers digging through Thursday and Friday hit rocky patches, officials decided to rope in the Rapid Metro as well as Delhi Metro, both of which have specialized digging equipment.
\nThe girl accidentally fell into the 70-feet deep borewell at the IMT township just before midnight Wednesday, sparking a major rescue operation involving the army and civilian agencies.
\nAccording to Gurgaon police, a four-year-old boy had similarly fallen into a deep borewell in the same area Feb 26, 2004. But he was rescued, thanks to the initiative of a police officer, Usman Ali.
\nThe father claimed that as soon as his daughter fell in the borewell, he called up the police, but they arrived one-and-a-half hours late.
\nFor two hours the child kept crying inside the borewell, asking for help, but now she is not responding to any calls, he said.
\nMeanwhile, the National Commission for Protection of Child Rights (NCPCR) has sought explanation from the Haryana Government to ascertain if it was the result of any negligence on its part.<\/p>\n\n