Three illegal miners died and one is missing in a coal mine owned by the state-run West Bengal Power Development Corporation at Barjora in Bankura. The mine pit is located at Baguli village in Barjora police station area. At the time of writing, experts of the Bankura Disaster Management Cell were working to rescue a few more villagers feared trapped inside the rubble of the caved-in pit. A speed boat also was pressed into operation to search for persons suspected to have drowned after the cave-in at the Bankura coal mine.

The officials were unable to trace any other illegal miner at the pit or its adjacent areas till Thursday evening.

The deceased illegal miners, identified as Habol Bagdi (50), Biswanath Bagdi (48) and a female loader Kali Bagdi (49) were from neighbouring Maliara village within Gangajalghanti police station area.

Another female illegal miner Rinku Bauri, according to the police and villagers, could not be traced and according to the police officials who inspected the pit, she is also feared dead, though her body couldn’t be recovered. Three others have suffered injuries as they were also caught in the cave-in. One of them, Ranjit Bagdi, was shifted to the Bankura Sammiloni Medical College & Hospital as he suffered multiple injuries in his head and chest.

The Barjora (North) coal block was initially allocated in favour of the Damodar Valley Corporation and the DVC had engaged Bengal Emta Coal Company, a private player, for mining and coal transportation. After the coal scam surfaced, the DVC’s mining lease was withdrawn in 2014 and mining operations at the Open Cast Project came to a halt. The abandoned pit took the shape of a lake after the monsoon rains over the last five years as the routine work of pumping out the water from the pit was also stopped.

After the West Bengal Power Development Corporation was allocated the mining lease of the abandoned pit in 2016, the state-owned power major engaged Montecarlo India – a Gujarat-based mining company as a substitute for the previous operator, Emta.

Montecarlo actively entered into the mining vertical in fiscal 2011 and the company has executed removal of overburden and excavation at the Barjora (North) Coalmine Project after entering into the contract.

The private partner is engaged for development, operation and maintenance of the mine to secure a 3 million tons per annum coal production for the state’s power sector.

As the mine’s coal faces were left open for years, a section of local residents from the adjoining villages in Barjora and Gangajalghanti police station areas frequented the deserted pit for unauthorised extraction and lifting of coal from inside the pit.

The coal-face, according to WBPDCL experts, could be visible about 100 feet below the surface and such illegal miners usually enters unauthorisedly into the pits.

Today, according to Mr Arup Sarkar, Inspector In-Charge of the Barjora Police Station, a group of male and female intruders from Maliara had sneaked into the pit and were trying to extract coal. During this, a portion of the pit caved in and seven persons including two women were crushed under the earth overburden.

A local resident Tapas Karmakar said: “A section of residents of the villages adjacent to the pit make beeline to the abandoned mining districts every day and collect coal, which they sell to some unauthorized depots operated by the traders illegally dealing in coal.”