BANEPA, Aug 15: An eleven-year-old girl from Banepa has drowned in a pit that was dug by an under-construction pharmaceutical plant located at Nala Raya village.
The girl, Ruksana Gole, according to police was a fourth-grader at the local Shristikanta Adharbhut Vidyalaya.
“She had already finished her exams and was on term break. However on Wednesday, she went to school to meet her sister who was writing her exam,” said Niranjan Ghimire, a police inspector in Banepa, adding, “While returning home along with her two friends she apparently jumped into the pit to swim.”
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The police have stated that the two girls who were with her watched her from the edge of the pit. “The two kids who were with Ruksana reported her missing when she did not come out of the pit for a very long time. By the time the police reached there, Ruksana was already dead,” said Ghimire.
The body has been sent to the TU Teaching Hospital for postmortem.
The construction company that has been assigned to build the plant has been ordered to take all necessary safety measures before starting the construction work, according to Sailesh Vaidya, the Nepal representative of the pharmaceutical company.
“We had strictly ordered the contractor to not let anyone other than the project staff and workers to enter the construction site. We are still studying how the incident occurred," Vaidya added.
With the intention of producing medicines for cancer in Nepal, Venkatesham Ambati, an Indian citizen who is the sole investor of Tizig Pharma Pvt Ltd, located in Banepa has invested Rs 351 million (Foreign Direct Investment) in the plant.
