In what the political opponents of Trinamool promptly christened “Burdwan-II,” a huge blast at an alleged cracker manufacturing site in West Midnapore killed at least 12 people besides injuring five others on Wednesday night.
The blast took place about seven months after the October 2 Khargragarh explosion that killed two Bangladeshi terrorists before blowing the lid off an elaborate conspiracy to eliminate top politicians of that country.
Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee, who promptly ordered a CID enquiry, said: “I have given instructions for a CID probe into the tragic incident where 12 people were killed in a cracker manufacturing unit. I have asked the police to look into the fact as to how they could amass so much material.”
BJP MlA Samik Bhattacharya accused the police of concealing the facts about the blast while his party demanded an NIA investigation into the explosion. A team of Pradesh Congress leaders led by local MlA Manas Bhunia also met Governor KN Tripathi to demand NIA probe in the blast.
State Opposition leader Suryakanta Mishra said any probe must be supervised by judicial authorities and added that the “Trinamool Congress has driven away industries from the State and has been promoting bomb-making units to rig and win elections.”
Ranjan Maity, a prime accused and a local Trinamool leader from whose house the cracker factory was running went underground immediately after the accidental blast. However his partner Ram Maity and his wife perished.
The CFSl experts recovered many vital clues from the area that included a driving licence from Tamil Nadu and a few printed materials written in Arabic, sources said. They alleged that Maity, a Trinamool leader, was a known “mafia don” who would import unknown faces from various parts of the State not only to manufacture crackers but also bombs to be dispatched to various places even outside Bengal for political purposes.
“They would import raw materials, drums load of aluminum powder and export not only crackers but also bombs,” a person who had worked at the site for a few days but left soon after alleged. He said at least 20 people had perished in the blast and the police had stuffed many bodies in gunny bags to dispose them off to unknown locations under the cover of darkness. “They even called the fire brigade three hours late,” another local said.
“It seems that it is an illegal cracker factory where the explosion took place,” Siddhinath Gupta IG Western Range said, adding those who died were mostly workers from outside who were making crackers to cater to the huge demand for fireworks in the wedding season.
Bodies were blown off and blood dripped from mutilated limbs even 12 hours after the blast. The adjacent houses developed cracks as the earth beneath shook under the impact of the explosion. The deafening sound could be heard from more than a mile away, locals told the police.