A parked car with a child inside began rolling down towards the Hooghly at Nimtala Ghat on Sunday morning after the 11-year-old accidentally pushed the gear.

Luckily for Ayush Jha, the riverbank was crowded and several people rushed in within seconds, pulled the car’s front door open, and dragged the boy out just before the Tata Zest hit the water.

“The white car was parked on the concrete ramp (by the side of the steps of the ghat), facing the river. Suddenly, it began rolling down the ramp. We saw a child in the front seat,” Suraj Shaw, an eyewitness, said.

The car’s windows had been rolled up and the rescuers initially thought the doors would be locked too. They tried to grab the car as it rolled down the ramp, hoping to stop it but realised this was futile.

“We thought the window would have to be smashed to bring the child
out, but a pull at the front door caused it to open easily, and a disaster was averted,” Shaw said.

It was Ganga Dussehra Puja — Goddess Ganga’s birth anniversary — and the riverbank was teeming with people.

Ayush’s parents had left him in the car and were a few yards away, walking towards the Bhootnath Temple, when they heard people screaming that a boy was being swept into the river inside a car.

“The family had come to perform Ganga Dussehra rituals. The boy was inside the car. The people nearby rescued him just in time,” Kashi Yadav, a relative of the boy, told The Telegraph.

Yadav said the car was an app cab owned by a family member who had brought “four or five people”, including Ayush and his parents, to Nimtala Ghat.

Police said the incident happened around 7.15am.

“An app cab somehow slipped into the Hooghly at Nimtala Ghat. A child named Ayush Jha from 320 Santi Pally in Narendrapur was inside the car but people rescued him before it fell into the river,” an officer from North Port police station said.

The car drifted some distance into the water but got only partially submerged. After about an hour, disaster management group personnel towed it out with the help of a pickup van, using cloth coiled into a thick, long rope that was tied to the car’s left rear-view mirror.

A group of people from the neighbourhood – young and old – got down into the river, forming a human chain and together pulling the rope to help bring the car ashore.

Hundreds visit Nimtala Ghat every day. They include devotees, tourists and people who come to perform the last rites of family members. The riverbank becomes especially crowded on special occasions, such as Ganga Dussehra Puja.

The officer from North Point station said this was not the first time a car had slid down the ramp at Nimtala Ghat.

“But this is the first time there was someone in the car. Fortunately, the child was rescued in the nick of time and is unhurt,” he said.