3-year-old rescued from well after 14 hours

BHOPAL: A three-year-old boy who had fallen into a deep well in a Madhya Pradesh village was rescued on early Monday, ending a 14-hour ordeal.

Amit Kushwaha had fallen into a 55 feet bore-well in Ghaneshwar village, in Katni district, on Sunday afternoon and got stuck at a depth of 22 ft.

Army personnel and officials of the local administration rescued the child at around 4.30 am on Monday after a 12-hour operation. "He is absolutely fine," local legislator Dilip Dubey said.

"The rescue operation to save the child began soon after locals informed the district administration about the incident. The child was being monitored through a closed circuit TV camera and oxygen supplied to him. A team of doctors was on ready," he added.

This is the third case of a child falling in a pit in the state in the past two months and the second in a month.

On December 31, 2006, five-year-old Kallu was trapped in a 216 ft pit dug for a tube well in Ujjain district. The child died after being taken out. A few days before that, another child died under similar conditions in Begumganj village in Raisen district.

Amit, however, was lucky enough to come out alive.

Four-year-old Prince of Haryana had attracted nationwide attention last year when he spent over 50 hours in a well into which he had fallen before he was rescued.