‘Saw hand protruding from water’: 3-year-old girl drowns outside Ghaziabad home

At 11 pm on Thursday, the narrow lanes of Sarvodaya Nagar, a neighbourhood in Ghaziabad, were silent. Residents sat on their haunches on staircases outside their houses, watching as the rainwater slowly receded. Every lane was caked in sludge and flanked by overflowing open drains, making it impossible to see what lay beneath each step.

Suddenly, anguished cries broke the silence from a house in Lane No. 44. Inside, 26-year-old Khusboo lay huddled on a mattress. “Kahan gayi meri ladki? (Where has my daughter gone?),” she cried out to the women surrounding her in a circle.

Earlier that afternoon, she found three-year-old Manvi’s tiny fist protruding from a heavily waterlogged stretch of road outside their home, where rainwater had accumulated to an estimated depth of about three feet. The child was pulled out and rushed to two hospitals, where she was declared dead.

Shobit Kumar (26), the girl’s paternal uncle, said, “It had been raining since last night, and water had entered the entire house. After the water began to recede, Khushboo was cleaning the room… Manvi managed to get out… she must have walked into the lane… A while later, Khushboo noticed a tiny hand protruding from the rainwater that had accumulated outside…”

The family, originally from Farrukhabad, a town in Uttar Pradesh, shifted here for employment around six years ago. While Khusboo is a homemaker, her husband is a vegetable vendor.

Her husband was still at the hospital, waiting for Manvi’s post-mortem report.

Khushboo’s WhatsApp profile picture shows Manvi taking her first steps while balancing on a stone. She was the youngest of the couple’s children.

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Assistant Commissioner of Police (Kotwali Ghaziabad) Upasna Pandey said around 2-3 ft of water had accumulated after heavy rainfall in Sarvodaya Nagar. “The girl drowned in the rainwater around noon. Her body has been sent for postmortem examination,” she said.

According to the India Meteorological Department, Hindon recorded 28.5 mm of rainfall and Kamla Nehru Nagar 31.5 mm in Ghaziabad on Thursday.

‘Every year, our homes get flooded’

Residents claimed this is not the first time the grief has struck the neighbourhood.

Anil Sharma, in his 60s, who lives a few houses away, alleged that around three years ago, a boy on his bicycle fell into a drain. His body was recovered after 25 hrs, 1.5 km away.

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“Every year, our homes get flooded with around three feet of water. Our doors, sofas, cupboards, and even the flooring get damaged,” he said.

Residents here aren’t wealthy, he said “We struggle to even earn Rs 20,000 a month.”

Though there is a network of drains, he claimed water from nearby areas flows here. “The drain is damaged and there is no boundary wall, so water from nearby neighbourhoods enters Sarvodaya Nagar,” Anil said, expressing anger over the alleged lack of action from the administration despite repeated complaints over the past years.

“We’ve filed complaints at every level including with several administrative officials and the councillor. We have a thick file of RTI applications and documents dating back to 2012. But nothing has been done. It’s the same story every year,” he alleged, pointing to a house across from the toddler’s where a family had been using pumps and plastic pipes for nearly 10 hours to drain knee-deep water.”

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A comment from the Ghaziabad civic body is awaited.

Another resident, Anagd (26), said, “Subah se makaan main paani bhar gaya hai. Na toh khaane ko mila hai, na toh peene ko mila hai, paani thoda khatam hua aur ye ghatna ghat gayi. Sab sadme main hai. (Since morning, our house has been flooded. We haven’t had anything to eat or drink. The water had only just started to recede when this incident occurred. Everyone is in shock).”

Back inside the house, Khushboo’s five-year-old daughter wandered around the room, seemingly unaware of the tragedy that had struck the family. Khushboo pulled the child into her arms and held her close.