– floating in Strathspey canal
THE body of 31-year-old GuySuCo employee, Vishanand Lall called Vishal was found floating in the Strathspey Canal, on East Coast Demerara, late Tuesday afternoon.
It was recovered a short distance from where he went under while swimming across with a working colleague round 17:30h on Monday. Lall perished after he experienced difficulty in the deep and efforts to save him, by his companion, Avo Singh, were unsuccessful.
The two men, employed as equipment operators at Enmore Sugar Estate, were returning home from work.
Police confirmed there were no marks of violence on the corpse and a post mortem examination, performed at Georgetown Public Hospital mortuary yesterday morning, gave the cause of death as drowning.
Lamenting the young man’s death, at his home yesterday, relatives and other GuySuCo workers expressed the view that, had their employer shown more care and consideration for the safety and lives of workers, then, perhaps, the man’s life would not have been lost in such a manner.
Highlighting the hazards of getting to and from work in the Coldingen/Strathspey area, where the electrical and diesel pumps used to drain the estate lands are located, they said it is a routine for workers to swim across the canal in order to avoid the perils of trekking a long and dangerous road, covered, for the most part, with murky, alligator-infested waters.
They said when rain is not falling and the road is dry, the truck would take them but, once it is raining heavily and the whole place is covered with water, the two bridges become submerged and crossing them in high water with under current is dangerous as they can, easily, be carried away.
“If you cannot swim, do not try to cross,“ they warned.

ONLY ALTERNATIVE
They said the only alternative to being exposed to such danger is swimming across the 40 feet and, to them, what Lall and Singh were doing the afternoon of the tragedy was routine, the lesser of two evils, they said.
Against the backdrop of such a situation, the workers want GuySuCo to provide a punt to them from Strathspey to Coldingen.
Relatives also claimed they received no support from Lall’s employer while the search for his body was being conducted.
They said four men, claiming to have been sent to the search site by GuySuCo, folded their arms and walked up and down the dam, as relatives and friends combed the waters to find the employee.
When the Guyana Chronicle visited the Enterprise family yesterday, relatives and friends were huddled together in the home trying to comfort the bereaved and outside construction of a canopy for a wake was underway.
Vishal’s sister, Vanessa said he is to be cremated at Good Hope Crematorium, also on East Coast Demerara, Sunday.
Lall is survived by his wife, Reshanti and three-year-old daughter, Anooksha, his parents, Ano and Shanta Lall, siblings Vanessa and Videsh.
The family thanked all those who, so generously, helped to find the body of their loved one.