5 girls drown in India

Five schoolgirls drowned Sunday in an irrigation tank near Aruppukottai in Virudhunagar district of the southern Indian state of Tamil Nadu, said police. The girls, all aged between 10 and 12 years, ventured after school into the deep end of the tank and were sucked under as they did not know swimming. Drowning is the leading cause of child unintentional deaths, accounting for over 30 percent of some 90,000 in India a year, according to official statistics. More children die from drowning in India than anywhere else in the world, and over 26,000 drowned in 2005 alone, mostly in southern, eastern and northeastern parts of the country due to heavy monsoon rains and storms there, said the latest account provided by police.