Sri Lanka, March 4 -- Holi celebrations in Odisha were overshadowed by tragedy this year, as six persons, including four minors, lost their lives in separate drowning incidents across the state on Wednesday.

In Sundargarh district's Kutra area, two minor siblings drowned in a pond near Litibeda village. Six-year-old Abhijit Toppo and his seven-year-old cousin Jisam Toppo had stepped out to play after celebrating Holi. When they did not return home for a long time, family members began searching for them and later found their bodies in a pond a few metres from the village. The children were rushed to the Kutra Community health Centre (CHC), where doctors declared them dead on arrival.

In a similar incident in Jhumpura area of Keonjhar di...