In a tragic incident, two girl students met with a watery grave while they were taking bath in the sea near Aryapali in Chhatrapur of Ganjam district on Thursday.
The deceased have been identified as Swapnarani Pandit of Kanisi and Prajnyarani Triapthy of Shergad. Tripathy appeared for Plus 2 second-year exam this year.
The incident occurred while the two girls along with four other friends had gone to take bath in the sea near their village. All six girls went deep into the water while swimming in the sea.
Hearing their screams for help, locals rushed to their rescue and managed to save four girls. After a thorough search, locals fished out the body of Pandit while Tripathy was missing. Her body was later fished out from the sea.
On being informed, fire services personnel reached the village and launched a search operation to trace the missing girl. Following request of special relief commissioner (SRC), a Coast Guard aircraft from Bhubaneswar was also deployed to trace the missing girl. The aircraft flew from Bhubaneswar and reached Aryapali to find the missing girl.