Police have named the eight students who drowned off Diveagar beach in Raigad district, Maharashtra, India, on Thursday, Oct. 1, 2026, identifying all of them as 16 years old and from Alandi, in Pune district.
The dead are Rajveer Vahile, Soham Bhandwalkar, Kaustubh Daund, Yash Wankhede, Kaivalya Wasankar, Tanmay Vahile, Sumit Ahire and Pranav Bansode. All were Class XI and Class XII students of Winners Academy, a private coaching institute in Alandi.
Police said the students ventured into the sea and were swept away during a picnic. The students entered the water around 3 p.m. on Oct. 1. The eight had misread how deep the water was and how strong the current was running, a police official said, and the sea then pulled them away from shore.
The outing had brought 48 people to the coast altogether, the official said, a group made up of 25 boys, 17 girls and six teachers. A search along the shoreline began within minutes.
Recovery and Aftermath
Workers of a local water sports club, alerted by the remaining students and teachers, recovered all eight bodies by 5 p.m. The bodies were sent to Shrivardhan Rural Hospital for postmortem.
The remaining 34 students were moved to a hotel in Diveagar after the drownings. Police registered an accidental death report, and police personnel and local authorities are carrying out further legal and administrative formalities, the official said.
Officials Respond to Deaths
Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis wrote on X: “The incident is extremely heart-wrenching. All the students were from Alandi, and the local administration is coordinating to bring their bodies home.”
Deputy Chief Minister and Pune guardian minister Sunetra Pawar said: “The drowning of eight students from Alandi is extremely tragic. I spoke to the Raigad district collector and superintendent of police, and instructed them to take all necessary actions.”
Maharashtra Minister Bharatshet Gogawale visited the hospital where the dead were taken. He told ANI: “It is a tragic incident. We will send the bodies back to the students’ villages after the post-mortem… We are working out way to send the rest of the people back to their places.”
Local residents gathered outside Winners Academy in Alandi late on Oct. 1. The Alandi Municipal Council sealed the academy on Friday, Oct. 2, saying it had been running without a business no-objection certificate and trade license. Alandi observed a shutdown the same day as families held last rites for the eight boys.
Echoes of a 2016 Tragedy
A busload of students has been lost to Raigad’s coastline once before. Students from Pune’s Abeda Inamdar Senior College — 14 of them — drowned at Murud beach on Feb. 1, 2016, roughly 140 kilometers (90 miles) south of Mumbai. Girls accounted for ten of the victims, and every one of the dead was aged between 18 and 20.
A human chain formed by 10 students to reach four drowning campus mates had itself been dragged under, initial information suggested. Those students belonged to a picnic group of 130, Raigad police said.
College authorities put the number of staff members, teachers among them, who had accompanied the group at about 10. Divers from the Navy and the Coast Guard brought up 13 bodies on Feb. 1, 2016; Madaki Saif Ahmed’s body surfaced the following morning, Feb. 2, 2016. Burial grounds and crematoriums across Pune drew hundreds of relatives and friends for the last rites, and the college declared a holiday on Feb. 2, 2016, to pay homage to the dead. The Maharashtra government announced compensation of Rs 2 lakh each for the next of kin.
High Court Sought Safety Probe
The Bombay High Court, on Feb. 3, 2016, sought a probe into the drowning of the 14 students at Murud-Janjira and asked the state to explain why beach safety rules were not being enforced there. Justice Naresh Patil, heading the bench, directed the state to report on conditions at beaches across Raigad district and to say why an existing government resolution on beach safety had not been implemented.
Bhagwanji Raiyani of Janhit Manch, a nongovernmental organization, had filed a public interest litigation (PIL) petition in 2009, and the hearing revived it. Civic authorities had earlier been ordered by the court to ensure the adequate appointment of lifeguards, watch towers and floodlights at night.
Goa’s beach patrolling unit was held up as a model for Maharashtra by advocates Jamshed Mistry and Pradeep Havnur, appearing for the petitioner, who said many of the court’s directions remained unimplemented at most beaches. The bench posted the matter to Feb. 12, 2016.