Slow progress in drowning prevention amid rising fatalities
According to the Accidental Deaths and Suicides in India report released by the National Crime Records Bureau last year, 38,503 people drowned in the country in 2022. Madhya Pradesh topped the number of deaths at 5,427, followed by Maharashtra at 4,728
Mumbai: A shocking video, now gone viral, shows a family, mostly children, clinging to each other amid a gushing waterfall. Minutes later, they are swept away by the current as onlookers fail to help. Tragically, five of them, including four minors and a woman, perished in this drowning incident in Lonavala, Maharashtra, on June 30.

On June 29, two school students drowned in a pond in Kerala. On June 28, three minors drowned while bathing in a river in Uttar Pradesh. On the same day, three people, including two children, drowned in waterlogged areas of Delhi.
These are just a few of the many drowning incidents that were reported. According to the Accidental Deaths and Suicides in India report released by the National Crime Records Bureau last year, 38,503 people drowned in the country in 2022. Madhya Pradesh topped the number of deaths at 5,427, followed by Maharashtra at 4,728.
Despite rising fatalities, government action on drowning prevention remains negligible. Water bodies, including lakes, ponds, rivers, beaches, and waterfalls, lack barriers, signage, lifeguards and accessible floating equipment, which onlookers can deploy during an emergency. There is also little safety awareness, especially among children.
In the Lonavala tragedy, the presence of a buoy, a personal flotation device, a net or a rope along the stream could have acted as a life-saving measure until help arrived.
“In many cases, onlookers jump into the waters without assessing the risk, resulting in double or triple tragedies,” said Dr Jagnoor Jagnoor, co-director of the injury division of The George Institute of Global Health, India, a World Health Organization (WHO) collaborating centre for injury prevention and trauma care. “However, in this case, onlookers tried to look for other sources of help like tree branches, which was a good sign in a way. Unfortunately, they were late,” she said.
Leading cause of mortality among children
Globally, drowning rates are highest among children in the age group of 1 to 14 years. “The highest burden is in the 1-3 year age group, and the risk of drowning increases by almost 30% when a child turns one,” said Dr Jagnoor.
Basic survival swimming lessons and structured care and supervision programmes can significantly reduce drowning deaths. In South Asia, Bangladesh, which records as many as 40 drowning deaths every day among children, has been a frontrunner in adopting multiple interventions. These include distributing playpens to households with younger children, establishing community-based childcare centres where children can be supervised, employing swim instructors, and teaching survival swimming skills to children aged 6-10 years. In Thailand, using indigenous buoys made of recycled plastic bottles has been a common practice, among other interventions.
In India’s West Bengal, ASHA and anganwadi workers are being trained in rescue and resuscitation, in addition to structured care and supervision of children. In the Sundarbans region, one intervention focused on installing physical barriers and fencing around water bodies in 10 gram panchayats. Goa has also implemented beach safety and survival swimming programs to prevent drownings.
Maharashtra has implemented some interventions on its beaches. For instance, on six beaches in Mumbai, the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation and the Mumbai Fire Brigade have stationed 93 lifeguards throughout the year. Additionally, a team of 11 civic personnel is kept on standby and is called into action during major drowning incidents. A few tourist beaches have functional watch towers. Waterfalls regularly accessed by tourists have warning signs, although the upkeep and visibility of these warning signs are questionable.
However, most states lack a structured approach and holistic policy to prevent drowning incidents.
Empower people to choose safety
In an implementation guide to prevent drowning, WHO recommends six interventions: installing barriers to control access to water, providing safe places (eg, daycare centres) away from water for preschool children with capable childcare, teaching school-age children swimming and water safety skills, training bystanders in safe rescue and resuscitation, enforcing safe boating, shipping, and ferry regulations, and building resilience to manage flood risks and other hazards locally and nationally.
Additionally, WHO outlines four strategies: strengthening public awareness through strategic communications, promoting multisectoral collaboration, developing a national water safety plan, and advancing drowning prevention through data collection and well-designed studies.
These were also adopted by the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare in its ‘Strategic Framework for Drowning Prevention’ launched in December 2023. However, efforts must be focused on the ground to make a real difference.
“The administration has been taking drowning deaths very lightly,” said Rear Admiral (Retd) PD Sharma, founder and president of the Rashtriya Life Saving Society (India), a nonprofit that trains people in operational safety, first aid, and resuscitation. “We need to train people to look after themselves and empower them with life-saving skills. This can happen with policy interventions directed to offer quality training in schools, colleges, workplaces, etc.,” said Sharma. He added that while we do need professional lifeguards, we need “lifesavers” even more. “Lifesavers are ordinary people like you and me trained in first aid and methods of dry and wet rescue,” he said.
Civic sense, self discipline must prevail
Drowning is an emergency where medical help is needed within minutes. The context of drowning varies with the kind of water bodies and the topography of the region—a drowning death could occur in a small temple pond, a bathtub, or even a bucket. Experts say that the NCRB data is a significant underestimation of drowning deaths. “We need robust state-level and country-level data,” said Dr Jagnoor, adding that a situational analysis to understand where the highest burden lies and what the interventions should look like is the need of the hour.
After the Lonavala tragedy, the government issued prohibitory orders across various water bodies for tourist safety. Deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar announced that warning signages will be installed near such tourist spots and prohibited areas, along with nets and barricading. But authorities also insist that civic sense must prevail and citizens must act responsibly.
“Nature must be enjoyed, not played with,” said Suhas Diwase, collector of Pune district, home to several monsoon tourist spots, including the waterfall in Lonavala where the recent tragedy unfolded. “People must understand the imminent danger while entering such forces of nature. We issue notices, put up warnings, and have safety equipment near water bodies that are open to the public, but citizens should be responsible for their own safety, too,” he said.

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