Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Friday met the rat-hole mining experts from Delhi who participated in the operation to rescue the 41 workers trapped in Silkyara tunnel and felicitated them. Later, BJP leaders also met and greeted them for their effort in the rescue operation.
They announced Rs 25,000 to each six rat miners. Earlier on Thursday, Delhi Congress president Arvinder Singh Lovely met six rat hole miners and felicitated them.
According to officials, some of them are involved in laying sewer lines and pipelines for the Delhi Jal Board. The DJB Chairman and Water MinisterAtishi along with other cabinet colleagues were also present during this period.
The Chief Minister mentioned that it's a matter of great pride for Delhiites that all of you are from Delhi and have been working with us in the DJB for many years. “As soon as the news of your arrival from Uttarkashi to Delhi was received, my wish was to sit and have tea with all of you. It's a great fortune for me to have the opportunity to sit and converse with all of you today,” Kejriwal said. These 15 individuals associated with the DJB were involved in the task of rescuing 41 people trapped in a tunnel in Uttarkashi. These people are connected with L.R. Sharma and the company are related to DJB and reside in different parts of Delhi. These 15 individuals formed three teams, each with expertise in different tasks.
The BJP leaders including Manoj Tiwari, Delhi unit president Virendra Sachdeva also met six rat miners and announced a cash reward of Rs. 25000 to each.
The six rat miners are Vakil Hassan, Munna Quershi, Rashid Ansari, Naseem Mallik, Irshad Ansari & Feroze Quereshi. Sachdeva said nation will always be grateful to these heroes for their swift work in saving 41 lives, what international machines couldn't achieve the rat miners achieved with their strong will power.
Earlier on Thursday, the Congress delegation led Arvind Singh Lovely met them and appealed to the central and the Delhi governments to honour them with suitable cash rewards and other facilities to acknowledge their selfless service.
Rat-hole mining involves digging of narrow tunnels, usually 3-4 feet high, for workers to enter and extract coal. The horizontal tunnels are often termed "rat holes", as each just about fits one person. At the Silkyara tunnel, the 12 experts were called by Trenchless Engineering Services Pvt Ltd and Navayuga Engineers Pvt Ltd to deploy the rat-hole mining technique horizontally in the collapsed part of the main structure.