Emergency workers have recovered the body of the lone missing person, Bikram Singh Rana, a project manager from Himachal Pradesh, following a devastating debris slip at a tunnel construction site at Kalladi in Wayanad’s Meppadi. The recovery of Rana’s body on the sixth day of the search during extensive operations in Zone II brings the death toll in the disaster to eight.
Rana’s body was found in an area where iron debris had accumulated following the disaster. Officials said that with the recovery of his body, all missing people had now been accounted for after the massive debris slip struck near the entrance to the under-construction Wayanad twin-tunnel road project on July 7.
After his relatives identified the body, it was shifted to the Vythiri Taluk Hospital for postmortem examination. Following the procedure, it will be shifted to the Kozhikode Government Medical College Hospital for embalming before being repatriated to his native place. The joint task force consisting of the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF), Fire and Rescue Services, State police, and local volunteers had been deployed to the disaster site to locate the missing person.
The death toll from the tragedy had risen to seven on Friday (July 10, 2026) following the recovery of another body from the downstream stretches of the Meenakshi river. The victim was subsequently identified by relatives as Rakesh Guchait, a 24-year-old project surveyor from West Bengal. Authorities had divided the disaster area into four operational sectors to ensure a systematic and scientific approach to the operation.
Rescue authorities had maintained that despite intermittent monsoon showers making the unstable terrain hazardous, search operations would continue until the final missing worker was found. With the recovery of Rana’s body, the search operations have come to an end.
