Visakhapatnam, September 19: It can't get better. For a couple who lost their twin daughters in a boat mishap on September 15, 2019, luck smiled on them two years later as they were blessed with another pair of girls and exactly on the same day T Appala Raju and Bhagyalakshmi's wards were killed.

The newborn twins have come as a Godsend for a couple that saw their world come crashing down after they lost their two daughters in a boat mishap in the river Godavari two years ago. It was an unexpected blessing in the form of the twins, daughters, that has now given Raju and Bhagyalakshmi of the Port City a new hope in life.

"We are so happy and blessed. It's all God's grace," said a beaming Bhagyalakshmi. Her family was pushed into gloom as they lost their two daughters in the boat mishap in Godavari on September 15, 2019. Appala Raju's mother was also killed in the accident when she was leading her grand daughters to Lord Rama's temple in Bhadrachalam in neighbouring Telangana in the ill-fated boat. Andhra Pradesh Shocker: Man Rapes Minor Cousin in West Godavari District; Case Registered Under POCSO Act.

Bhagyalakshmi and her husband, an employee in a glass manufacturing unit, approached a fertility centre in the city last year for children, but the COVID-19 pandemic put paid to their efforts.

But luck smiled on them this year as the efforts fructified and twin daughters delivered through IVF process, precisely on September 15, 2021. "We did not expect twins, but it's a real blessing," Bhagyalakshmi said. Dr Sudha Padmasree said the case was taken up as a challenge and priority. "The couple were fully supportive," she noted. The twins weighed 1.9 kg and 1.6 kg and were healthy.