Kolkata, Feb 13 (IANS) A special National Investigation Agency (NIA) court on Thursday convicted three accused in connection with the blast at Gangpur in Birbhum district of West Bengal in September 2019.
The three accused convicted on Thursday by the NIA court include local Trinamool Congress leader Bablu Mondal. His two sons Mrityunjay Mondal and Niranjan Mondal, who are currently absconding, had also been convicted on Thursday.
The NIA court will pronounce the sentence in the case this week only. It is learnt that the three accused in the case under Section 3 and Section 5 of the Explosive Substance Act, the maximum punishment under which could be life imprisonment.
The blast took place at Bablu Mondal’s residence at Gangpur on September 20, 2019. The intensity of the blast was such that the entire roof of the residence was blown off and the construction collapsed.
However, fortunately, there was no casualty following the blast since no one was there at the residence at the time of the blast.
The police initially opened the investigation, and registered cases against the three accused and arrested all three of them. However, all three of them managed to get the bail. After being released from behind the bars in bail, the two sons of Bablu Mondal went absconding.
Later NIA took over the investigation following an order of the Calcutta High Court and arrested Bablu Mondal again. Later the central investigating agency submitted a chargesheet at the special court of NIA in the matter in September 2022.
In the chargesheet NIA mentioned that huge explosives items were stocked at Bablu Mondal’s residence to create political terror in the area.
Birbhum district has been in the news frequently for recovery of explosives items from time to time.
This week only, the cops of district police recovered 320 sacks containing 16,000 kilograms of ammonium nitrate from a truck also at Rampurhat.
Last month, the West Bengal police recovered as many as 20,000 detonators and 15,000 gelatine sticks from an abandoned house located at a jungle area at Rampurhat.
As it is, recoveries of illegal detonators and gelatin sticks are quite common in Birbhum district because of the innumerable stone quarries in the district where such explosives are used for the purpose of stone blasting.
To recall, huge explosives items including 81,000 detonators, 27 kg of ammonium nitrates and 1,925 kilograms of gelatin sticks were recovered at Muhammadbazar area of Birbhum district on June 30, 2022.
–IANS
src/pgh