The rescue operation team recovered another corpse, of a woman, from the overburden dump heap of the Kulda opencast mines on Monday. The body was identified as that of Mamata Majhi, a native of Balinga village, who had gone missing since the mishap at the mines on August 10, and handed over to her family members.
With this, the total death toll of the mishap has gone up to as high as 13.The recovery of the body on Monday brought respite for the MCl authorities as the villagers were putting pressure for continuing the rescue operation at the site for recovery of this body. The villagers had also forced the closure of the mines demanding recovery of dead bodies. The MCl officials and district administration, after lot of efforts, were able to resume mining activity in the mines only five days ago.
“We are relieved today as all the dead bodies, claimed by the local villagers, have been recovered from the coal overburden heap,” said General Manager, Basundhara coalmines, an MCl unit, AK Singh. “Since, the villagers have made no claim of any more dead bodies inside the heap, we have closed the rescue operation,” Singh added.