Uluberia vehicle drown case: Trapped inside sinking car, boy recounts the horror
Telegraph | 26 November 2025
A day after a pool car plunged into a pond in Howrah’s Uluberia, killing three children, 11-year-old Arka Mondal described the terror of being “in the water and swallowing it”.
One of the two survivors, the Class IV student of Mother Marina Mission School is still terrified, his parents said on Tuesday.
Arka was inside the sinking Maruti Omni when it veered off the road and fell into the pond. Three children died; only Arka and his friend Priyam Bag survived. On Monday, Arka was too shaken to speak. When Metro spoke to him on Tuesday afternoon, he recounted the moments of panic, confusion and desperate attempts to escape.
Arka and Priyam had been seated in the front. Moments earlier, the driver had dropped off another child, Arshita Mondal of Class I. The vehicle then hit a large tree, its front wheels lifted, and the car spun before crashing into the pond. In the back seat were the three children who did not survive: Souvik Das, 11, Ishika Mondal, 7, and Areen Dey, 6.
Arka’s account:
I was scared. The water was constantly getting into my mouth. I was completely in the water, throwing my arms around and not knowing what to do. Then I found a little space to move. It was the window.
The car was sinking. I kept trying to get out. The window was open, and somehow I slipped through it. But how would I reach the bank? I don’t know how to swim. Driver kaku saw Priyam and me. He had already reached the bank.
He swam back to us. Thankfully, we were not very far from the edge of the pond. I held on to him. He first helped me to the bank and then Priyam.
We stood there, watching the car drift towards the middle of the pond and sink deeper into the water. It was happening very quickly. Three children were still inside.
Within minutes, villagers rushed to the pond, but by then the car had gone under.