5-Year-Old Girl Dies Of Thirst While Walking Through Rajasthan Desert

The five-year-old girl died due to dehydration while they were walking in scorching heat to meet her grandmother's sister in a village a little over ten kilometres away, said district officials.

In the middle of the hot sand dunes in Raniwada in Rajasthan's Jalore district, a child lying dead and her grandmother unconscious next to her is an image that has sent shock waves across the state. The five-year-old girl died due to dehydration while they were walking in scorching heat to meet her grandmother's sister in a village a little over ten kilometres away, said district officials. It appears somewhere along the way the intense heat and humidity took its toll. They fainted due to a heat stroke and the little girl eventually died while the elderly woman lay unconscious till a shepherd spotted them and informed the local village head who in turn called up district officials. The grandmother was suffering from dehydration and that was the cause of death of the child, too, police said. "The woman and her grand-daughter were not carrying water with them and that appears to be the cause of death, '' said Padmaram Rana, a local police station inspector.