4 months after Balco mishap, 3 Chinese arrested

Nearly four months after the chimney collapse which claimed 41 lives at the Vedanta Resources-controlled Bharat Aluminium Company Ltd’s upcoming power plant in Korba district of Chhattisgarh, police today arrested three Chinese officials in connection with the incident. Police said Shandong Electric Power Construction Corp (SEPCO) project in-charge Woo Chunan, engineers O Lou and Wan Qung were arrested and produced before Korba judicial magistrate Sarojnand Das who rejected their bail plea and sent them to judicial custody. After the September 23 incident, police had registered a case of culpable homicide not amounting to murder and common intention under Sections 304 and 34 of the IPC and other provisions dealing with voluntarily causing grievous hurt. Four Chinese officials were told to remain in the country while 70 others were allowed to return to China. Ads by Google Earlier, police had arrested Manoj Sharma, project manager of Gannon Dunkerley & Company Limited (GDCL) which was engaged in construction of two industrial chimneys for the BALCO power plant. BALCO vice-president and project manager Viral Mehta, assistant general manager (project) Deepak Narang and graduate trainee engineer Anoop Mahapatra were also arrested. BALCO had entrusted work of the power plant to SEPCO which had sub-contracted the chimney construction work to the GDCL. Sources said police action against the Chinese officials came after the investigating team received a detailed report from Raipur-based National Institute of Technology which studied the chimney collapse. A judicial commission, headed by district and sessions judge Sandeep Bakshi, is also probing the circumstances that led to the chimney crash.