Cops raid illegal firecracker factory in Ghaziabad, seize material worth ₹3 cr

The suspects told the police that the factory was operated by and supplies distributed among several people, who had allegedly operated a unit at Bawana in Delhi where 17 people died in a fire in 2018

The Ghaziabad police said on Tuesday that they arrested six persons for allegedly operating an illegal fireworks manufacturing factory near the Manan Dham area under the jurisdiction of Madhuban Bapudham police station. They said that the material recovered from the suspects was valued at about ₹3 crore.

The manufacture and sale of firecrackers has been banned by the Supreme Court. (Representative image/HT Archive)

Police identified the suspects as Ravi Kumar, Sandeep Singh, Akash Singh, Rakesh Kumar, Vishnu Kumar, and Arvind Ram. According to the police, the six suspects were handling the operation of a laboratory and the manufacturing unit at the site.

“The premises comprised two sites, one for a laboratory wherein the suspects mixed different chemicals to use for manufacturing firecrackers, and the second as the actual manufacturing unit. The suspects could not produce any valid document permitting them to manufacture fireworks and they were arrested,” said Nipun Agarwal, superintendent of police (city 1).

“The suspects told us that the factory was operated by and supplies distributed among several people, who had allegedly operated a unit at Bawana in Delhi where 17 people died in a fire in 2018. They told us that the suspects obtained bail in the Bawana case and started operating the illegal factory in Ghaziabad. We are ascertaining their roles and our teams will launch searches to arrest them. This factory has been in operation for the past three months,” Agarwal added.

Police said three-storeyed building, where 17 people died in a fire in Bawana, was registered as a plastics factory but was illegally used as a unit to package and store firecrackers.

Ghaziabad police said that they are on the lookout for Manish Jain, Lalit Goyal, and Tarun Rai in connection with the operation of the illegal factory near Manan Dham.

The police said that during the raid, they seized about 16 different-sized drums and plastic cans which contained chemicals, besides 400 cartons of manufactured firecrackers and other different materials and equipment used for their manufacture.