They were identified as Ibrahim Mian Ripon, a student of class X, Abhishek Barua and Arefin of class IX of Agrabad Boys' High School.

Sources said, a group of 11 students of the school went to the beach and started playing football at around 11:00am.

At one stage when the ball went into the seawater Ibrahim ran to fetch it and was carried away by the sea.

It prompted Abhishek and Arefin to rush for saving Ibrahim, only to be caught up in the huge waves and meet the same fate, said the witnesses.

All the three boys remained missing since then.

Rescuers from fire service rushed to the spot but failed to conduct any search as the sea was very rough. Divers of Bangladesh Navy were preparing to launch a search operation at 5:30pm.