Bhubaneswar, Aug. 25: A septuagenarian woman had a miraculous escape after she fell into an open manhole and survived through the night before being rescued in the morning in Old Town here today.

Dukhi Sethy had left home around 7pm for a walk yesterday. When she did not return home, her family members searched for her before giving up at midnight.

"We searched for her frantically till midnight, but failed to trace her," said Sarat Sethy, Dukhi's nephew.

As morning broke, Dukhi's family members were getting ready to lodge a missing person complaint at the Airfield police station. Around 7am a few local residents alerted them that an elderly woman had been spotted inside a 15ft deep manhole on Tarasundari Lane behind Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation Hospital.

"We were getting ready to visit the police station to lodge a missing person complaint, when a few local residents informed us that my aunt had been found inside a manhole," Sarat, who belongs to the economically weaker section, said.

Members of the family rushed to the spot and by then the fire brigade had been informed. A team of fire personnel arrived at the site at 7.20am to carry out the rescue operation.

A local resident, who was among those who spotted the old woman trapped in the manhole, said what caught their attention was a shaking bamboo pole. Local residents had inserted the bamboo in the open manhole to alert people about the impending danger. When they went near the manhole, they found a traumatised Dukhi shouting from inside and shaking the bamboo pole to draw the attention of passers-by.

The firemen took no time to carry out the rescue operation that lasted for an hour. The woman was brought out after she had spent 12 hours inside the manhole.

"We first had to clear concrete attached to the manhole to ensure that it did not fall on the woman. A fireman was tied to the rope and lowered into the manhole with a chair. The woman was put on the chair and pulled up to avoid any further discomfort and injury to her. She was completely traumatised and had sustained injuries on her head. We immediately rushed her to the Capital Hospital," said Ganesh Kumar Patra, a fire brigade official involved in the rescue operation.

"The patient arrived in a state of trauma and with a head injury. It took eight stitches to seal an open gash in her head. She was discharged after her condition stabilised," said a doctor at the Capital Hospital.

Though there was no eyewitness when she fell into the manhole, CCTV footage obtained from a nearby shop captured the moment of the accident. The visual showed that it was raining when she was walking all alone between 7pm and 8pm. As she approached the manhole, she slipped and fell into it. There was no one around to spot the mishap.

The footage also showed that almost a month ago local residents had put a bamboo pole inside the open manhole and flagged it with empty cement bags to alert commuters.

Angry local residents said that the manhole was lying open for the past six months on the busy stretch that has a hospital, several schools and also connects the Lingaraj temple. They said that repeated requests to the local councillor to cover the manhole did not elicit any response.

"The road is used among others by students and parents of two schools, patients and relatives coming to the BMC Hospital and devotees going to the famous Lingaraj temple. As the authorities did not pay heed to our demands, we had marked the area by inserting a bamboo pole and empty cement bags. The woman was saved as the manhole was not filled with rainwater," said Pradeep Kumar Prusty, a social worker and a local resident.

Local councillor Diptimayee Samartha said she had written several times to the Public Health Engineering Organisation (PHEO) to cover the manhole, but they did not pay any heed to her requests.

PHEO superintending engineer Chitta Ranjan Jena, however, passed the buck on to the sewerage board. He said the board was responsible for laying new sewer lines in Old Town area. The manhole in which Dukhi had fallen was a new one, he said.

"Once it is handed over to us, we will take care of its operation and maintenance," said Jena.