The police continued to question factory owner Sajjanraj and his family to ascertain how they were able to hoodwink authorities and store chemicals illegally in a godown in a residential area at Bapujinagar. The godown, where 1,800 barrels of chemicals used in paint thinners and santisiers, caught fire on Tuesday.
Sajjanraj is the owner of Rekha Chemical Industries, and his wife Kamala Sajjanraj owns Rekha Chemicals Corporation, while their son Anil Kumar, runs the family business. They were arrested from their house at Shankarpuram on Wednesday.
“We are gathering a list of firms that bought chemicals from Sajjanraj regularly. Right now, we have details of two companies, while the rest of them are retail buyers,” said a police officer.
The couple has two factories in Bommasandra Industrial Area and the licence to run both, but did not have the permission to store chemicals in the godown. According to the police, Sajjanraj was also purchasing inflammable chemicals from Mumbai, Kochi, and Chennai. They included acetonitrile, toluene, acetone, methyltetrahydrofuran, isopropyl alcohol, methylene chloride, and chloroform. He would then sell them to retailers and companies in the city. “We probing whether he had permission to sell them from the godown.
Minister for Health and Family Welfare and Medical Education K. Sudhakar on Thursday visited the godown. “There are allegations that sanitiser was not only stored but also illegally manufactured at the godown. I have come here to check for myself how our the Drug Control Department has functioned, whether the operation here had come to the notice of our officers, or if not, why the enforcement was lax,” the Minister said.
He, however, added that while there were reports that sanitiser was stored and manufactured, the chemicals present at the godown was a solvent, some thinners used in paints, and also some alcohol-related compounds. This needs to be thoroughly probed. There are reports that a prominent corporate was buying sanitiser from here, which will also be illegal as this was an unlicensed firm. They will also be culpable,” he said.
The residential area is limping back to normality as the power and water supply was restored on Thursday.
