While the labourers were carrying out cleaning work, a rod fell into the manhole. When one of the cleaners, Ajay, tried to look for it, his phone slid out of his shirt pocket and fell inside. Illustration/ Ravi Jadhav

In a bid to look for a cell phone that accidentally fell into a manhole, a BMC cleaner was suffocated to death. While he was declared dead on arrival at a hospital, another labourer, who entered the dirty hole to rescue him, died while undergoing treatment on Friday.