A nine-year-old visually impaired girl reportedly fell into a 35- to 40-foot-deep open drain near Shastri Bridge on Ahmedabad’s Narol-Pirana Road on October 10, and remained untraced for about 22 hours, according to a report by Gujarat Samachar. The incident has renewed scrutiny of open drainage infrastructure, inadequate street lighting and the safety of pedestrians using one of the city’s industrial corridors.
The child, identified in the report as Manisha Salat, was travelling with her mother in an autorickshaw when she reportedly fell into the uncovered drain while getting down near the roadside. Her mother was paying the autorickshaw fare at the time, the report said. The family was described as being dependent on daily-wage work in the Pirana-Piplaj area.
Police and fire department teams reached the location after the incident was reported and began searching the drain and the route towards the Sabarmati riverbank. The operation was complicated by a flowing water channel estimated at around 15 feet in depth, as well as poor visibility caused by the absence of street lights at night, Gujarat Samachar reported.
The report said that a large search operation was conducted up to the Sabarmati riverbank, but the child had not been located at the time of publication. It also said the mayor visited the site. The account did not establish the child’s condition or confirm the cause of the water flow, making the search operation the immediate focus of the authorities.
Residents alleged that illegal discharge of chemical-laced wastewater into open drainage lines takes place in the area at night. They further alleged that the flow may have exposed the child to chemicals or carried her downstream. These claims were presented as allegations by local residents and were not independently established in the supplied report.
The incident has also raised questions about the responsibilities of the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation and the Gujarat Pollution Control Board. The report linked the location to open drainage infrastructure and alleged failures in preventing hazardous discharge. It said residents had accused both agencies of negligence, although the supplied material did not include a detailed response from either authority.
Gujarat Samachar also referred to earlier deaths in open drains in Ahmedabad’s Kubernagar and Odhav areas. According to the report, two people had previously died after falling into open drainage channels. It alleged that the authorities had failed to prevent a repeat incident and that covers were installed overnight on open drains along the Pirana-Piplaj Road after the latest accident.
The reported response highlights a wider operational problem in urban safety: hazards that remain exposed until an accident forces an emergency intervention. The supplied report does not state how many open drains were present along the road, whether the stretch had been inspected earlier, or whether the newly installed covers met municipal safety standards. The immediate next steps are the continuation of the search operation and clarification from the civic and pollution-control authorities on the drain’s ownership, water flow and safety arrangements.
