Kovalam tragedy: Second body retrieved from near Colachel

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Four days after five people went missing in the sea at Kovalam, one more body was washed ashore at Mandakkadu coast near Colachel on Wednesday. The body was identified as that of Akhil P Jayan, son of K Jayan of Pulimoodu.​
Akhil, along with four others, had gone missing in the sea off Kovalam on Saturday evening. The body of Anoop had been washed ashore at midnight on Saturday.
Akhil's body was brought home by 9.30pm on Wednesday. Health minister V S Sivakumar, mayor K Chandrika and district collector Biju Prabhakar paid homage to the deceased youth. His body was cremated late in the night at their ancestral property at Pothencode.
Coastal police and city police have been in touch with Thirunelveli and Colachel stations for search operations, considering that strong undercurrents could have taken the bodies to Colachel and Kuzhithura.
Sahaya Jose, marine police inspector at Colachel said they had got the information from fishermen in the morning. "As soon as the body was brought ashore, we sent pictures via WhatsApp to Kovalam police. Later the body was identified as that of Akhil around noon," Jose said.
Akhil wore a black thread on his right hand which helped relatives identify his body. A four-member team from Kovalam police along with relatives of Akhil had left for Nagercoil to identify the body. The postmortem was held in a hospital near Colachel and the body was brought to his residence at Pulimoodu by Wednesday night.
Pandi Gangadhar, a police officer with Colachel sub-division said district collector Biju Prabhakar had sent a communication to him seeking help to retrieve the bodies. "We have passed alerts to locals and fishermen to report whether they spotted the bodies in the sea. We have intensified search for the remaining bodies," he said.
Earlier in the day there had been rumours about two bodies being washed ashore at Colachel. S Suresh Kumar, station head officer with the Vizhinjam coastal police said they had received information only regarding one body. Sahaya Jose also said that only the body of Akhil was washed ashore on Wednesday.
Meanwhile, the state government has sought the service of the Indian Space Research Organisation to employ remote-sensing technology using satellites to search for the bodies. Earlier coast guard and marine enforcement team had failed to find the bodies.
Four college students Anoop Giri, Jithin G Carmel, Akhil P Jayan and Nithin Raj, and another youth Abhishek Sasikumar, 33, had gone missing at Sea Roack beach on Saturday night.