The police have arrested four persons and seized explosive materials during raids that started on Thursday.
The seizures were part of an exercise codenamed ‘Operation X-ray’ to make sure whether records maintained with the dealers of explosives matched with their stock. A special team, led by Deputy Superintendent of Police (Prohibition Enforcement) K. Kumarave, raided a shop at Esalani near Varichiyur under the Karuppayoorani police station limits.
Verification of the records revealed that the dealer did not keep proper records.
The team found that nitrate mixture, ordinary detonators and electric detonators were either in excess or less than what was entered in the records.
Similarly, the same dealer had kept a huge quantity of nitrate mixture and electric detonators on an unlicensed premises in the neighbourhood.
The owner of the shop, R. Devadass, and two of his employees, P. Murugesan and Swaminathan, were arrested by the police.
At AustinpattiIn a raid conducted in Austinpatti on Friday, the team found 20,000 electric detonators, 1,500 metres of safety fuse and 12 bags of ammonium nitrate stocked on an unlicensed premises. The police arrested K. Paraman (47) of Chekkanoorani who had stocked the explosives in a motor room near his godown.
