Five person die attempting to rescue cat from biogas pit in Maharashtra's Ahmednagar

PUNE: The bodies of five persons, who drowned in an animal waste slurry collected in a pit in Maharashtra’s Ahmednagar district, have been recovered hours after the incident, officials said on Wednesday.

The incident took place at Wakdi village in Nevasa tehsil on Tuesday evening, and the bodies of the five deceased persons were fished out post-midnight by the authorities, they said.

“We have recovered the bodies of the victims from the animal waste slurry in the biogas pit. The bodies were taken out by 12.30 am on Wednesday and sent to a government hospital for post-mortem,” Nevasa police station’s inspector Dhananjay Jadhav said.

A cat had fallen into the pit, and one person climbed down to rescue it but got stuck in the sludge inside, he said.

“To rescue him, five others climbed down one after another and also got stuck inside,” Jadhav said.

While five persons died in the incident, one was rescued and is currently undergoing treatment at a hospital, he added.