The Hindu : National : More explosives found abandoned

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Oct 12, 2004

National

National

More explosives found abandoned

By Our Staff Reporter

NEW DELHI, OCT. 11. With pressure mounting, panic-stricken owners of scrap units in several parts of the country are now resorting to dumping of hazardous waste by the roadside.

In yet another major recovery on Monday, 219 shells in sacks were found abandoned at Dichaon Kalan village in Najafgarh here.

The National Security Guards (NSG) and the Army were called in for segregation and controlled detonation of the live shells.

According to the Deputy Commissioner of Police (South-West Delhi), Deependra Pathak, the Police Control Room received a call around 11-15 a.m. informing them that three sacks of explosives were lying in the village. "We recovered 219 shells, of which six are suspected to be live," said Mr. Pathak.

The Inland Container Depot at Tughlakabad here has sought the assistance of the Delhi police to scan 46 more scrap-containers suspected to be carrying explosives. The containers were imported by the Ghaziabad-based firm from some of the African countries.

Seven shells recovered from Kakraula village in West Delhi on Sunday have been buried and local police were awaiting the Army's bomb disposal squad to defuse them.

In Ghaziabad, where 10 persons were killed in an explosion last month, the Army today completed the sifting operation aboard 10 of the 11 trucks stationed at Kanha Upavan. An Army officer said that no explosives were in the scrap. He said the last truck would be scanned on Tuesday.

On Sunday, over 250 shells and bombs were recovered from a drain in the Secunderabad industrial area of Bulandshahr in Uttar Pradesh, while one was recovered from a container stationed at the Tughlakabad depot here.

The Superintendent of Ghaziabad Police, Umesh Srivastava, said the police searched 18 steel units but no explosives were found. On the recovery of shells and bombs in the district over the last few days, he said the police were trying to trace those who had dumped them.

Major haul

Our Special Correspondent in Jaipur reports:

In their continuing drive to unearth contraband ammunition, the police today reportedly seized 14 rockets, at Bilhaheri and Kehrani villages near the Bhiwadi industrial area in Alwar district of Rajasthan. Over 190 pieces of live ammunition and thousands of empty shells have so far been recovered in and around Jaipur.

The scrap containing the ammunition was found in the fields adjacent to the industrial area today. It had apparently been thrown there by someone aware of the searches being carried out in a foundry in the State capital.

Police sources said the Army were informed and the ammunition was being examined to ascertain its combustion capacity. About 24 foundries in Alwar reportedly import the scrap regularly.

While the scrap buried by a Jaipur-based firm is being dug out to recover live and empty shells of ammunition pieces, two drums containing similar explosives were found abandoned near Dudu on the Jaipur-Ajmer highway on Sunday.

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