Prince pulled out of 60-feet well; gets Rs 2 lakh, blessings

Haldera/New Delhi, July 23 (UNI) With the entire nation uniting as one in prayers for his survival, a five-year-old boy Prince was pulled out of a 60-feet well by Army jawans in a marathon 50-hour rescue operation in Haldera, while Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda announced a grant of Rs two lakh for the boy and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee sent him their blessings.

Watched by the nation on television, the frantic efforts of the rescue teams of the 65 Engineers Regt backed by the Indo Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) and the civil and police administration, yielded results this evening, when an army jawan reached out to touch the boy, who lay crouched in the 16-inch diameter hole. Prince had been lying in that position since he fell into the hole on Friday evening while playing with his friends.

Assisted by the army jawan, the boy crawled through the tunnel which the Engineers had dug from a abandoned well, 10-metres away from the hole in which Prince was trapped.

The Chief Minister also announced a grant of Rs 51,000 each to every member of the rescue team that went into the well to pull out the trapped boy and bringing him up to safety.

The state government also announced the boy will be given free medical aid.

Mr Mukherjee congratulated the Army, the Air Force, Maharashtra Fire Service and the government of Haryana for a very well coordinated effort to rescue Prince out of the well.

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