Thirteen children aged 15 or younger drowned Tuesday night when a crowded boat capsized in Bihar’s Vaishali district, state officials said, turning a short river crossing to a neighboring village feast into one of the deadliest civilian accidents in the state in months.
District Magistrate Varsha Singh told reporters the vessel overturned around 8:30 p.m. while carrying roughly 20 children who were traveling to attend a community meal in another village. Seven survivors were pulled from the water and taken to Nalanda Medical College and Hospital in Patna, where Singh said their condition was stable Wednesday morning.
Recovery and identification
Search teams worked through the night along the stretch of river near Hajipur, the district headquarters. Singh said all 13 bodies recovered by morning were children 15 years old or below, a detail that sharpened public anger in a state where informal boats still link villages separated by monsoon-swollen channels. Police had not released a full passenger list by midday, and it remained unclear whether any adults were aboard or whether the boat was licensed for the number of people it carried.
Local media footage showed villagers gathering on muddy banks as officials coordinated divers and district disaster teams. Bihar’s chief minister, Samrat Choudhary, announced ex-gratia assistance of 400,000 rupees for each bereaved family, while Prime Minister Narendra Modi said the central government would pay 200,000 rupees from the Prime Minister’s National Relief Fund to the next of kin of those killed and 50,000 rupees to each injured survivor.
Political response
Modi posted on social media that the loss of life was “deeply painful” and that local administrators were assisting affected families. Opposition leaders in Patna demanded a time-bound inquiry into whether the boat was overloaded, whether life jackets were available, and why a night crossing was permitted on a route known to swell after recent rains. State disaster management officials said they would examine whether warning signs or village-level transport rules were enforced along the Ganga in the Raghopur area, which feeds the Ganges plain and carries heavy informal traffic during festival seasons.
Context on river safety
Boat capsizes remain a recurring hazard in Bihar and neighboring Uttar Pradesh, where embankments and bridges lag behind population growth and families rely on narrow wooden craft to reach schools, markets and religious gatherings. National crime and accident statistics have repeatedly flagged overcrowding and absent safety gear as common factors, though enforcement is uneven and many vessels operate without registration.
Vaishali, north of Patna, is densely populated agricultural country where river levels can rise quickly after upstream releases or local storms. Singh did not attribute the capsize to weather in her initial briefing, saying only that the investigation was ongoing and that rescue operations had concluded once all missing children were accounted for.
What families face next
With funeral rites beginning in affected villages, district officials said counseling teams and revenue officers would help families access the announced compensation. Hospital authorities in Patna said they would keep monitoring the seven survivors for complications from hypothermia or water inhalation. For now, the district’s focus is on confirming identities, returning bodies to families, and determining whether criminal negligence charges are warranted against the boat operator or local officials who may have allowed the crossing.