Orissa boat accident: 2 bodies recovered, 5 still missing

Bhubaneswar, Nov 3: Bodies of two pilgrims who drowned when an overloaded boat capsized Monday in the Mahanadi river in Orissa's Cuttack district Monday, were recovered Tuesday. Five passengers are still missing.

"We have recovered two dead bodies so far from the spot. We will continue the search operation for a few hours more, then we will see," said Arbind Agrawal, the sub-collector of Athagarh in Cuttack district, about 25 km from state capital Bhubaneswar.

According to the officials, the chances of survival of the missing pilgrims are grim.

The boat capsized at Mancheswar ghat while ferrying pilgrims to Dhabaleswar temple, where there was a heavy rush as it was Kartika Purnima (full moon of Kartika month of Hindu calendar). More than 20 people were rescued Monday.

Earlier Tuesday, the district administration took the help of international scuba diver Shabir Bux and his team to help in the search. However, the search operation failed to trace out other pilgrims who had drowned.