Rajkot: Five youths, including two brothers, drowned in a rivulet on the outskirts of city during immersion of Lord Ganesh idol today, police said.
“Some youngsters of Mavdi Plot area of the city came to Jamnagar Road to immerse Lord Ganesh idol in rivulet. We have been been informed by the eye witnesses that when two youths started drowning, three others jumped into water to save them.
However, all of them died eventually as they could not come out,” said Rajkot Superintendent of Police Antrip Sood.
Fire department superintendent K V Dhela said that a group of seven youths had entered the water for immersing idol.
“In total, seven youths had entered water. Out of these seven, two were saved by locals while five others drowned,” he said.
The bodies of the deceased, identified as Nimish Vala (26), Sagar Parmar (21), his younger brother Vishal Parmar (19), Ravi Rajput (25) and Nitin Parmar (21), have been fished out.
Police have registered an accidental death case and sent the bodies to civil hospital for postmortem.