In an apparent re-run of Khagragarh and Pingla blasts a huge stock-pile of bombs exploded late on Thursday evening at Amodpur village in Kharasole of Birbhum district killing two persons both close kin of a local Trinamool Congress leader, sources said adding there could be more deaths.
The incident was certain to draw the attention of the Election Commission ahead of Bengal Assembly elections scheduled to take place in a few months from now experts said.
Those killed were the brothers of the local Panchayat member Jabir Husein. The house in which the bombs were stock-piled caved in under the impact of the blast locals said adding there were more dead bodies in the debris which were carried away by some unknown men who were present around the area.
Those dead had been identified as Sk Hafizul and Sk Tariq Hussein brothers of Sk Jabir Hussein the Trinamool leader sources said. “The blast was caused by crude bombs. They were either stored in the house or had gone off while making them,” District SP Mukesh Kumar said while experts wondered how explosion of crude bombs could bring down concrete structures.
Similar blasts had killed two persons at Khagragarh in Burdwan district on October 2, 2014 and 14 persons were killed a few months later at Pingla in West Midnapore where the dead bodies were tossed 60-70 feet up on the trees from where they were plucked down by the police.
The Khagragarh blast which also occurred in a Trinamool leader’s house later blew the lid off an elaborate terror network being hatched from Bangladesh to assassinate the political leadership of that country.
At Pingla the police however managed to erase the footprints of the case, locals alleged even as Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee and SP Bharati Ghosh respectively claimed the blasts had taken place in an illegal fire-cracker factory.
Birbhum has been a political hotbed with a fierce turf war going on between the Trinamnool and BJP and the police repeatedly unearthing huge stockpiles of bombs often thousands in numbers from places like Chowmandalpur, Makhra etc.