By the time his distraught family had found him, Abdul was dead.
The family feared something was wrong when the boy did not return home for iftar -- when the day's fast for Ramzan is broken -- three hours after he had left home yesterday evening.
He had gone to play cricket in a DDA park located at Avantika, Rohini, along with three of his friends when he fell into the pit filled with rainwater, the police said.
Abdul's maternal uncle, Mohammed Mumtaz, said the boy went out every day to play cricket during his summer holidays.
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"He would leave the house around 4 pm to play cricket with his friends. He would return around 7.15 PM, in time for iftar. But when he did not return yesterday, we started looking for him," he told PTI.
He said Abdul's father returned from work around 7 PM and inquired about his whereabouts from his wife.
"She is disabled and stays at home. He started looking for him and spoke to his friends and they told him about the incident," Mumtaz said.
The pit, nine to ten feet deep, had been dug for dumping leaves for decomposition, but had not covered, leading to rainwater collecting inside, the police said.
His friends saw him fall but were too scared to inform anyone about it. They went back home.
By the time the family found him and took him to a hospital, he was dead.
The police said they were informed about the incident around 8 PM. They inspected the spot where the boy had fallen and found that there was no signboard near the pit indicating that the area was out of bounds.
Locals said it was only after the incident that the DDA put up a board and a makeshift fence around the pit.
Mumtaz said he had lost his nephew because of DDA's "carelessness".
"What is the point of putting up a fence now when the damage has already been done? There are three pits in the area that have been dug up for people to dump garbage. They are hazardous for anybody but the authorities are not bothered," he said.
The senior DDA official said the urban authority "takes all precautions" at its properties to prevent untoward incidents.
Abdul, whose father works at a bangle store in Sadar Bazar, lived with his parents and sister in Mangolpuri and studied in Class V at a school nearby.