Three children, who were third and fourth standard students of the Government Urdu School at Nagaram under five-town police station, were found dead in a pit filled with rainwater behind the school on Saturday morning.
The children were identified as Shaik Sohaib (7), son of Shaik Hussain, Mohammed Asar (7), son of Asif, (both in third standard), and Shaik Arba (9), son of Rasool and in Class IV. They were all from the weaker section colony in Nagaram.
The parents lodged police complaints when the children who went to school on Friday did not return.
As they were suspected to have drowned in the pit, which was dug for hard soil used in construction work, the police engaged expert swimmers. The bodies were retrieved on Saturday morning and there were heart-rending scenes at the school and in the neighbourhood.
Locals and relatives staged protest in front of the police station, demanding arrest of teachers, who, they said, were negligent, and those responsible for digging deep pits for commercial purpose near the school. They also demanded ex gratia for the bereaved families.
The police registered a case and sent the bodies to the Government General Hospital for post-mortem.
