Madhya Pradesh, 8 die of gas asphyxiation in a well

In the village of Kondavat, in the district of Khandwa, eight workers had gone down to clean it in preparation for the diving ceremony during the Gangour Mata festival. The victims were trapped and died of suffocation. Compensation of 400,000 rupees (4,200 euros) has been announced for the families. Activist Fr Prakash Louis: ‘It could have been avoided. Do workers come from disadvantaged castes? Is their life worth so little?’

Khandwa (AsiaNews) - In a tragic accident that took place in the village of Kondavat, in the area of Chaigaon Makhan, district of Khandwa, eight people lost their lives after descending into a well to clean it in preparation for the immersion of images of the popular deities Isar and Gauri during the Hindu festival of Gangour Mata. The authorities reported that the victims probably died because of toxic gases emanating from the water.

According to the local administration, the accident happened around 4pm on Thursday. Initially, five villagers descended into the well, but when they became trapped, three more people joined the rescue attempt.

All eight later died; authorities attributed the deaths to inhaling poisonous gases that had accumulated in the well, which had been inactive for a year.

The staff of the State Disaster Emergency Response Force, the local police and the villages launched a rescue operation that lasted four hours. In the end, the bodies were recovered and an autopsy was performed.

The administration announced compensation of 400,000 rupees (approx. 4,200 euros) to the families of each victim. The eight victims have been identified as Mohan (55), Anil Patel (30), Sharan Sukhram (30), Arjun (35), Gajanand (25), Baliram (36), Rakesh (22) and Ajay (25). The Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh, Mohan Yadav, also confirmed in a post on X that all eight people died of asphyxiation.

Jesuit Father Prakash Louis, former director of the Indian Social Institute in New Delhi and human rights activist, told AsiaNews: ‘This is a tragic accident.

The Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh and the district administration have also called it a tragic accident. However, no one is saying or accepting that this could have been avoided’.

The Jesuit therefore draws attention to the minimum safety standards for these operations, which are not considered and ensured for the workers.

‘Tragedies of this kind should not be repeated,’ he continues. ’Then, if it should happen again, what punitive measures will be taken? These workers come from low castes and I'm not sure if they acted alone or were hired by someone else.’

Fr Prakash Louis considers the compensation provided for the families to be at least ‘positive’, but asks: ‘Is this the value attributed to the lives of our brothers? The lives of these workers are not worth just 400,000 rupees. How can their loss be replaced with a reward?’