IAS officer jumps in pool to save woman colleague, drowns

A 30-year-old Indian Administrative Service (IAS) officer drowned in the swimming pool of a training institute in South Delhi late on Monday night, reportedly after he jumped in to save a woman colleague at a pool party.

However, the officer's family has asked for an investigation, stating that he was a good swimmer. The deceased, Ashish Dahiya, on Monday evening was with around 30 other civil services batch-mates at the Foreign Service Institute when the tragic incident took place.

All these officers were celebrating their last day of training for the Indian Foreign Service (IFS). Later, they reportedly decided to go for a swim in the institute's pool. "We suspect that they were drinking in the party," said police.

"Statements of eyewitnesses reveal that while swimming, a lady officer probably had an accidental slip into the pool and many young officers, including the deceased, made an attempt to rescue her. As the woman was safely pulled out, it was noticed that Ashish was missing.Soon, he was seen floating," said Chinmoy Biswal, Additional DCP South Delhi.

Following this, he was immediately pulled out and the station medical officer, Dr Pramyesh Bansal, was called.

Dahiya was given CPR before he was taken to hospital where he was declared dead around 1 am. The police said, "By the time we arrived, the officer had been taken to hospital by his colleagues."

The deceased officer's suspect something amiss, and has called for an independent investigation.

Dahiya was Deputy Superintendent of Police in Himachal Pradesh when he appeared for his civil services exam in 2015 and was selected for the IAS. The promising officer later decided to go for the IFS and cleared it.

Soon after the incident, the accident site was secured and a team of senior police officers was sent to collect evidence like CCTV footage and record statements of those present at the party including the staff of Foreign service institute.

"It looks like a case of death due to drowning, we cannot comment on a foul play until a post-mortem is done,' said DCP South Ishwar Singh.