Boat tragedy: Seven drowned; one missing

The desire to click selfies in the middle of a reservoir resulted in a tragedy for a group of picnickers with the boat carrying them capsizing in Vena dam in Maharashtra's Nagpur district, police said today.
While seven bodies have been recovered till this evening, one person still remains untraced since the tragedy occurred last evening.
The bodies of six men, all in the age group of 19-22, were fished out today, while one was traced last night, a police official said.
Multi-agency rescue teams comprising personnel of the fire brigade, the State Disaster Response Force (SDRF), local fisherman and divers have been carrying out search and rescue operations since early this morning.

"Seven bodies were fished out of the dam till this evening and search is on for the missing person," Kalmeshwar police inspector Chandrashekhar Bahadure said.
The bodies have been handed over to their respective families after postmortem, he said, adding the police have registered a case of accidental death.

The vessel carrying 11 people including three boatmen had capsized last evening. However, three persons--two boatmen and a college student -- were rescued last night.
Those rescued are undergoing treatment at a private hospital here, said Shailesh Balkawade, SP, Nagpur Rural.
"It seems these youngsters had hired local fishermen for boating, which is not allowed in the dam. The boat they got into was narrow. It tilted and capsized when they started clicking selfies on reaching the mid point of the reservoir," the SP said.

Meanwhile, Bahadure said one of the victims had uploaded a video of their picnic on Facebook.
The deceased have been identified as Roshan Khandare (21) and Akshay Khandare (19), both boatmen, Paresh Katoke (21), Pratik Aamthe, Pankaj Doifode, Rahul Jadhav (22), and Ankit Bhoskar (22)--all residents of Nagpur. The missing man is named Atul Bhoyar.