Don’t know if we’ll ever go back to work there: Victims of NTPC power plant blast

Suresh Kumar Shah (left) with Rakesh Kumar Mehta at KGMU Trauma Centre on Thursday. Avaneesh Mishra

At the KGMU Trauma Centre, two friends, who were daily wage workers at the NTPC unit, were talking. One of them, a victim of Wednesday’s mishap, sat on the bed, his burned hand now covered with thick bandage. “We were pulling up the bench machines through chain pullers to place it at a particular height. We had pulled one and was going for the second one when suddenly we heard the deafening sound of a blast. Within seconds, everything around us was black. There was thick smog, coal ash and heat all around,” said Rakesh Kumar Mehta (29), a rigger at the unit for the last six months. He suffered five per cent burns in the incident.

At his side, Suresh Kumar Shah, 30, said he got lucky as he was close to an exit managed to run out to safety soon after he heard the blast. “It was around 2.30 pm when the coal ash, which comes out of the furnace, stopped. NTPC officials arrived to check it. They probably found that the ash was blocked somewhere and in order to release it, they started pouring water from the other side. A few minutes we heard an explosion,” he said, adding that he had been a worker at the unit for the last one year.

“Though nothing was visible in the unit then, we later saw people seriously burnt and lying there. Ambulances reached and at around 10 pm and those who were critical were brought to the KGMU,” he said.

Another worker who survived is Haider Ali. His nephew Istefaq Khan, 30, wasn’t so luck; he suffered 100 per cent burns.

“I was working there for long and had brought Istefaq around six months ago as he was jobless,” Ali said. “Now, I am not sure if we will ever go back.”