The accident at Hindustan Shipyard Limited here that claimed 11 lives has been the fourth industrial accident in the city since May this year.
On May 7, 12 persons died over 580 were hospitalised in LG Polymers styrene monomer vapour leak incident. On June 29, two persons died and four were injured due leak of hydrogen sulphide at Sainor Life Science at Jawaharlal Nehru Pharma City, and on July 14, one employee had died and one was injured in Visakha Solvents in JNPC due to fire in the reactor.
Negligence, say Left parties
CPI (M) State secretariat member Ch. Narasinga Rao told The Hindu that it was clear case of negligence, as adequate precautions were not taken, since the crane had been under construction for such a long period.
CPI State secretary J.V. Satyanarayana Murthy demanded an independent judicial inquiry and said that the string of industrial accidents in the last four months called for some accountability in industrial safety.
All the Left parties and trade union leaders, including Neerukonda Ramachandraiah from INTUC, demanded that the family of the deceased be paid ₹1 crore as compensation, as it was paid in the case of LG Polymers. They demanded that the people responsible in HSL be arrested.
The union leaders questioned the design of the crane and raised doubts on why it took 11 years to complete a 70 MT level luffing crane and if there was some kind of urgent pressure to complete and commission it.
Oldest shipyard
HSL is the oldest shipyard in the country founded by industrialist Walchand Hirachand in 1941 under Scindia Steamship Navigation Company. In 1961, the shipyard was nationalised and renamed Hindustan Shipyard Limited (HSL). In 2010, HSL was transferred from the Ministry of Shipping to the Ministry of Defence.
The Malkapuram police are investigating the incident and cases have been booked, said Commissioner of Police R.K. Meena.
