Blast in drum leaves 7 injured in Digboi

From our Correspondent

DIGBOI, Feb 20: In a rather mysterious blast that took place within a closed empty blue drum at the residence of Susil Mandol at Station Area under Digboi Police Station, seven persons suffered fire injuries.

According to police, the injured were identified as Rashmi Sengupta (9), Ankita Mandol (6),  both suffered 30  per cent superficial burn injuries, Sikha Mandol (35) suffered 18 per cent superficial burn, Subroto Mondol (6) suffered deep and superficial burn (50 per cent) , Anja Madol (13) sustained 9 per cent burn while Payal Mandol (16) suffered 2 per cent superficial burns.

According to sources, Dilip Bhattacharjee, a PDS agent of Station Area had bought a blue drum from a hardware vendor Manoj Kumar Agarwal of Tili Bazar on Friday afternoon for his use in his PDS shop. According to Bhattacharjee, the blast happened when his servant Susil Mandol took the drum, which was kept outside the shop, to his house for safe keeping. The high intensity blast resulted in burn injuries. However, the injured were immediately rushed to  Dibrugarh AMCH for advanced treatment after being administered prelimiry treatment at AOD Hospital, Digboi.

Talking to The Sentinel, Manoj Kumar Agarwal ,who described the incident as accidental, said that he had been selling blue drums for 10 years without any hazardous outcome. According to him, the blue drum had been sold by Hindustan Lever Limited, Doomdoma, and vendors sell such blue drums to people.

The incident is being investigated, though the OC said that the blast was accidental and unfortute.