3 killed, many feared trapped after illegal coal mine collapse near Dhanbad, Jharkhand
At Narayankuri, a highwall miner machine was engaged to cut and retrieve coal, right next to the shaft where the villagers had entered fetch residual coal blocks when the coal layer above collapsed trapping them inside the shaft.
“It is indeed an alarming incident that illegal mining was happening in an active mining project right next to where the contractor engaged by us was cutting coal. We have show-caused the contractor – Gainwell Commosales Pvt Ltd and sought an explanation for the same and will take adequate action,” said Niladri Roy, the director (technical) Operations at Eastern Coalfield Limited (ECL).
The incident also led to the ECL authorities to deploy guards and CISF officers at the mine, something that the opposition political parties had been demanding for several months.
Bansagopal Chowdhury, CPM leader and former two-time MP from Asansol Lok Sabha constituency said he wrote to the CMD of ECL on September 9, alerting them about the coal theft happening at Narayankuri and the dangers it posed for the villagers.
“The contractor is hand in gloves with the coal mafias who are allowing coal theft and is thus endangering the lives of the local people who are being lured into the mines for quick and easy money. We had highlighted it before the ECL and police, but nothing has happened,” said Chowdhury.
Cops too passed the buck on ECL as a senior official requesting anonymity said the area is outside their purview of direct intervention and that they too had written to ECL to deploy guards and fence the project.
“Highwall projects offer a certain degree of natural fencing. But it is astonishing that the contractor had left the main entrance too without any fencing or guards. We will ensure this doesn’t happen in future,” said Roy.
A team of the Coal India Safety Board who visited the site on Friday also pointed out the gross negligence in terms of absence of fencing and guards.
“In this highwall mining project layers of coal are sandwiched between sand-stones and shell stones. The highwall miner digs like a caterpillar straight inside
coal seam at the highwall till the ultimate pit limit. It has a bit-laced cutting drum, and the coal is fed back through a materials handling system to the bench by the highwall, where it is loaded out. The villagers had entered one such shaft where the machine had finished work. Coal can still be dug out from there manually but there is always a risk of roof collapse like the one that happened on Wednesday,” said GK Shrivastava, a senior member of the board told TOI after his visit.
Meanwhile after remaining suspended for two days since the mishap, minor activity began at other portions of the mine away from the site — where the cave-in had happened on Wednesday – began from Friday afternoon.
“There are no bodies left in the mine and we can resume work. But taking lessons from the instance we plan to increase awareness among the villagers to not to engage in illegal mining anymore which can lead to catastrophise like this,” said another ECL official.
