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MHA asks NIA to probe 2022 high intensity blast in Bengal
In March this year, an explosion claimed three lives at an illegal factory at Maheshtala in South 24 Parganas
Six months after a high intensity blast at the residence of a Trinamool Congress booth president in West Bengal’s Medinipur killed three persons including the party leader, the Centre has asked the National Investigation Agency (NIA) to probe the bomb making industry in the state.
A notification was issued by the ministry of home affairs (MHA) last week under the NIA act, which allows the Centre to hand over any case across the country filed under the scheduled offences to the federal agency without the consent of state government.
“...manufacturing of illegal bombs or firecrackers has become a cottage industry in the state of West Bengal and the incidents of accidental blasts are taking precious lives of innocent civilians; ...the local population is being terrorized by such incidents,” the notification said.
A high intensity blast ripped through the house of Rajkumar Manna, TMC booth president, in Naruabila village in Purba Medinipur on December 2 last year, in which Manna and two others were killed. Reports at the time claimed they were making firecrackers inside the house.
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leader Dilip Ghosh said then that “only bomb making industry is flourishing in the state”.
West Bengal police invoked sections related to criminal conspiracy (120B), negligent conduct with related to fire and explosive substance (285 and 286) and causing death by negligence (culpable homicide) besides section 26 of the West Bengal Fire Safety Act in the case.
Based on the MHA order, NIA filed a first information report (FIR) on June 4 in the matter and added sections 3 and 4 of explosives act in it.
Another high intensity blast in an illegal firecracker factory in East Medinipore’s Egra on May 16 killed nine people and critically injured seven others, prompting the BJP to seek a NIA probe in the blasts. The Egra blast is being probed by the West Bengal CID (Criminal Investigation Department) but chief minister Mamata Banerjee has said she has no objection to a NIA probe provided the agency arrests the real culprit.
Several blasts in what have euphemistically been termed as illegal firecracker units by the state government and the police have taken place in West Bengal since 2021. In December 2021, three people died at Nodakhali in South 24 Parganas district. In March this year, an explosion claimed three lives at an illegal factory at Maheshtala in South 24 Parganas.
NIA and the West Bengal government are in a standoff over the former taking over cases related to violence during Ram Navami in Hooghly and Howrah on March 30.
The agency has already registered six first information reports (FIRs) in May in connection with the Ram Navami violence, but the state government is yet to hand over documents to it, people familiar with the development said.
