Search called off as army fails to rescue boy

Rescue operations to find 12-yr-old Aas Mohammed were called off by army personnel and civic authorities as they failed to locate him.

Rescue operations to find 12-year-old Aas Mohammed, who fell into a deep sewer tank left open by civic authorities, were called off on Wednesday after army personnel and civic authorities failed to locate the boy.

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Rescuers called off operation after 35 hours as they failed to recover the boy, who had fallen into the 12-feet-deep pit filled with poisonous gases and sewage water at 9 a.m. Tuesday.

"We have to call off the operations, as we suspect the child might have been swept away in the high water current," said Naveen Arora, senior superintendent of police.

"A pit that runs for five kilometres and then opens into the Hindon River was searched completely. But no clue was found, so the search process was halted," he added.

Aas had slipped into the open sewer tank while playing cricket with his friends near a bus stand in Islam Nagar in this Uttar Pradesh town.

On Tuesday, an angry mob went on a rampage, pelting buses with stones and stopping traffic to protest local authorities arriving at the spot two hours late.

In a similar incident last year, the army had rescued a six-year-old boy, Prince, from a 60-ft deep pit in Kurukshetra, Haryana.