Arjun's lorry may still be on land, says Ranjith Israel, search progressing in Shirur

BENGALURU: Kerala is waiting for Arjun, a native of Kozhikode, who went missing along with his lorry in the landslide on the national highway in Shirur. The search has started on the seventh day since the incident. Intermittent rain is hampering the search that started on Monday morning at 7.30 am. People engaged in the rescue operations said that there are rocks in the ground that cannot be moved even by Hitachi machines.

The army had reached Sunday afternoon for the rescue operation. It has been decided to remove the soil from the land and the river and carry out the search today. A detailed search of the river will be done after the search on land. Arjun's relatives are in Shirur. They will not return without seeing Arjun.

Meantime, rescue worker Ranjith Israel concluded that Arjun's lorry may still be on the land. Ranjith clarified that the lorry may be near the mountain on the road. He said that everything possible is being done for the rescue operation, but the lack of advanced radar system is a disadvantage.

The new conclusion is that Arjun and the lorry could be inside the island-like sand dunes formed in the river Gangavali by landslides. A deep search metal detector that can be used on water and land will be brought to search here. 40 soldiers under the leadership of Major Abhishek arrived from Belagavi but the lack of radar hampered the rescue operations. The search by the army was stopped at 7.30 pm on Sunday night due to continuous heavy rains and landslides. The Karnataka Revenue Minister had said that 90 percent of the soil that had fallen on the road had been removed and despite all this searching, there was no trace of the truck.