Summer swim turns fatal for 3 in Ludhiana.

Ludhiana: A weekend swimming excursion turned to tragedy when three young men drowned after being swept away by strong currents in the Sirhind Canal near Ludhiana’s Dehlon zone on Sunday evening.

The young men — Varinder Singh, 20, Vinay Kumar, 22, and Ajay Kashyap, 21 — had travelled to the canal stretch along the Ghawaddi-Khanpur road with a fourth friend to escape the summer heat. Investigators said the group had entered the water around 4.30 pm but quickly drifted into a deep, fast-flowing section of the waterway.

Onlookers launched a quick rescue effort while alerting emergency services. Local residents managed to pull one youth from the water alive, while police divers subsequently retrieved the remaining three.

Deputy commissioner of police (Rural) Jaskiranjit Singh Teja confirms that Vinay Kumar and Kashyap died on the scene. Varinder Singh was moved to a nearby hospital in critical condition but he died during emergency treatment. The fourth youth survived without major injuries.

The tragedy underscores a persistent public safety crisis along Ludhiana’s waterways. The Sirhind Canal has become a notorious blackspot for drowning incidents, frequently driven by recreational swimming and structural road accidents. In recent years, local authorities have repeatedly struggled to enforce swimming bans along the banks, where powerful undercurrents routinely catch even experienced swimmers off guard.