Bodies of two Himachali youths washed away in strong currents of Yamuna found in Haryana

Nahan (HP), Sep 26 (PTI) The bodies of two youths who were swept away by the swollen Yamuna river three days ago while taking a dip at Yamuna Ghat in Himachal's Sirmaur district were fished out from the river in Haryana, police said on Friday.

The deceased, identified as Amit (23), Kamlesh (22) and his brother Rajneesh (20), were residents of Gawali village of the district. The tragedy occurred on September 23 when they were reportedly returning to their home after taking a holy dip in the Ganga at Haridwar with a religious procession of the local deity of their village.

After putting the palanquin of the local deity to rest in Paonta Sahib, the three youths went to take a dip in the Yamuna, and the unfortunate incident happened.

According to officials, when one of them started drowning in the water, the two others jumped to rescue him, but all were swept away.

While Amit's body was recovered from the Kaleshwar area of Yamunanagar on Wednesday, the bodies of the remaining two — brothers Kamlesh and Rajneesh — were recovered about 25 km away from the place where they were washed away.

Kamlesh's body was found near the canal of Pratap Nagar in Yamuna Nagar late on Thursday evening, while his younger brother Rajneesh's body was recovered from the Hathni Kund Barrage on Friday morning, the police said.

Paonta Sahib SDM Gunjeet Singh Cheema said that personnel of Sirmaur police, along with the national and state disaster response force, Indian Army's First Para Special Force, Nahan, and local divers conducted an over 60-hour operation to locate the missing youths. PTI COR BPL AMJ AMJ