BAHAWALPUR: A female farm worker and two minor children died after they took `contaminated` kakri (long melon) while 16 others, most of them women and children, fell unconscious in a Choilistan village ear Yazman, about 50km from here, on Sunday.

According to emergency service 1122, Bahawalpur, nearly 20 women and their children were busy in picking cotton in village 74/DB.

During the lunch break, they consumed kakri sown in a field adjacent to cotton crop reportedly sprayed with pesticides recently.

They were rushed to the Yazman THQ hospital where a woman and two children died.

Two of the injured were said to be in critical condition. Police said they were looking into the matter.