The tragic drowning of a Noida student has sparked a police investigation and allegations of negligence and potential foul play from the victim's mother, who claims his friends failed to help and delayed informing her of his death.
The mother of a 23-year-old student, who died after allegedly drowning in a water-filled pit in Sector 94 here, has accused his son's friends of not attempting to save him and alleged that she was not informed about his death in time.
An FIR has been registered against three students, Krish, Himanshu, and Vyas, based on a complaint filed by the deceased's family, police said, adding that further investigation into the case is underway.
The deceased, Harshit Bhatt, a final-year Bachelor of Physical Education student at a private university, had gone on a picnic, with three others, to an abandoned construction site within the Sector 126 police station area on Wednesday evening after their examinations ended, they said.
Speaking to reporters at her residence in Ghaziabad, Bhatt's mother, Deepmala, alleged that neither the friends nor the police informed her about her son's death.
"When our neighbour called on Harshit's phone, we were told he had met with an accident. Nobody, neither his friends nor the police, informed me about his death," she said.
She further claimed that her son's visit to the location appeared "suspicious" and questioned why his friends took him there.
"Why did his friends take him to that specific location? If he had gone there to bathe, they should have stopped him. He was a good swimmer and was about to become a physical education teacher," she alleged.
She said that the post-mortem report did not indicate alcohol consumption and claimed that there were multiple injury marks on his body, raising suspicion of foul play.
"I fear that he may have been murdered. I want a fair probe into my son's death," she said, adding that authorities should identify and secure such hazardous spots to prevent similar incidents.