A man, his son and a worker at a pickle factory died after they fell into a tank filled with preservatives at the unit in Ghaziabad’s Loni, the police said on Sunday.
Illegal factory
The deceased have been identified as Luvkush (60), Praveen (35) and Ram Dubey (46). The police said that Luvkush was running the factory in Tronica City illegally. All of them were residents of Delhi. The incident happened when the tank was being cleaned.
A senior police officer said that the police reached the spot after they received an information on Sunday morning that several persons had died in a factory after they fell into a tank filled with preservative chemicals.
Teams of National Disaster Response Force and Uttar Pradesh Fire Department reached the spot.
There was a tank-like structure at the unit where they used to process vegetables and chemicals to make pickles, the police said. The unit was running in the basement of Luvkush’s house. He had created it to dilute pickles in it. There was chemical poured inside the tank.
The man and his son were the ones to fall into the tank first, said the Sub-Divisional Magistrate. When his wife shouted for help, one of the workers came and tried to help them get out of the tank, but instead fell into it and drowned, he said.
The bodies have been sent for post-mortem and a magisterial probe has been ordered into the matter. The Fire Department team had to break the wall during the operation.
The bodies were later taken out of the tank. DSP Durgesh Kumar said an FIR has been lodged and a probe is on into the matter.
Locals have also alleged that several other illegal units are running in Loni, but the police and the administration have not been taking any action against those.
