Bengal cm visits kin of victims of cracker unit blast

Bengal cm visits kin of victims of cracker unit blast

Opposition parties lambast her for waiting 11 days to visit Khadikul; CM vows action against officers who fail to crack down on illegal factories.

Eleven days after an explosion at an illegal firecracker factory in Khadikul village in West Bengal claimed 11 lives, Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Saturday visited the village and apologised to the people for the incident.

“I bow my head in front of you and apologise for this incident,” the Chief Minister said. She distributed cheques of ₹2.5 lakh as compensation to family members of the deceased and promised that one member of each family would get a job as a home guard under the West Bengal Police.

Ms. Banerjee said that the officers in charge of local police stations must take action against illegal cracker manufacturing units. The Chief Minister pointed out that the officer-in charge at the Egra police station had been transferred after the incident.

Panel set up

Speaking at a public meeting later in the day, Ms. Banerjee said that she had set up a committee headed by the State’s Chief Secretary to develop the government’s policy on firecrackers.

Villagers alleged that under the garb of making crackers, crude bombs were being manufactured at the illegal unit. The prime accused in the May 16 explosion, Krishnapada Bag alias Bhanu Bag, also died of injuries sustained in the blast.

Ms. Banerjee stressed the need to secure the borders of the State.

However, Opposition parties slammed the apology. “This is a fake apology. If the CM was moved by the plight of the victims, then she should have gone earlier,” CPI(M) leader Bikash Ranjan Bhattacharya said.

BJP leader and former president of the West Bengal unit Dilip Ghosh said that the Chief Minister was putting the blame on other States when it was the West Bengal police which was actually at fault.

“Everyone in the village knows what was going on and the road to the illegal unit was on encroached land and was built by the local panchayat,” said Mr. Ghosh, who had visited Khadikul village on May 18.

During the day, Ms Banerjee participated in a Trinamool Congress outreach event which organised by party’s general secretary Abhishek Banerjee.