Nellore: Around 450 men belonging to the Indo Tibetan Border Police, Army and Navy are searching for the missing bodies of the engineering students from Hyderabad who were washed away in Beas River in Himachal Pradesh last Sunday.
The massive operation is being supervised by the National Disaster Response Force. The 16 km stretch between a dam downstream and the spot where 24 engineering students were washed away has been divided into 30 segments, and 15 men have been deployed in each area to trace the bodies.
Minister for urban development Dr P. Narayana said that the search is being conducted between 6 am and 11 am and from 2 pm to 6 pm after stopping discharge of water from the dam. The minister said that release of water from the reservoir of the Larji hydropower project near Thalot can’t be stopped totally as the water level keeps increasing because of the inflow from melting snow in the hills.
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The hydro power project generating 128 MW comes under the northern grid and permission has been obtained to halt generation at fixed intervals for the search. The water temperature is around 8 degree Celsius, the temperature of chilled water, and it is one of the reasons for the bodies missing. Bodies surface only when they get decomposed, and it takes time for putrefying gases to form and bring the bodies to the surface.
The chilly water prevents speedy decomposition, and there are instances of bodies from bus accidents being found three months after the incident. Dr Narayana said that all bodies can be found eventually. He said the Himachal Pradesh government had summoned ace swimmers to assist the paramilitary forces. Dr Narayana said that he along with Telugu Desam MP Khambampati Rammohan Rao and principal secretary Sharma were coordinating with the Himachal Pradesh transport minister Bali.
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