Baruipur police constituted a special investigation team (SIT) on Saturday to probe the cause of the fire that engulfed two warehouses on Nazirabad Road, off EM Bypass near Anandapur, early on Republic Day morning, and to identify those responsible for the deaths.
The death toll has yet to be ascertained. Police have recovered 25 body parts and received 27 missing-person complaints so far.
According to police sources, the superintendent of the Baruipur police district will lead the SIT, which will include other senior officers, including the additional superintendent.
“The SIT will oversee the investigation and ensure all areas are probed before drawing up a chargesheet. The members of the SIT will meet daily to review progress in the case,” a senior officer of the Baruipur police district said.
Union home minister Amit Shah, who is visiting Bengal, said on Saturday that the Anandapur fire was not an accident but a fallout of the Trinamool government’s alleged corruption. Addressing party workers in Barrackpore, Shah said: “Has the state administration completely ceased to exist in Bengal?”
The SIT was formed a day after the police arrested two managers of the Anandapur warehouse of the momo chain Wow Momo, where at least three employees died on Monday morning.
The owner of the adjoining warehouse of a decorator agency, where the fire is
suspected to have originated, had been arrested earlier. Gangadhar Das is in police custody.
Wow Momo’s warehouse manager Manoranjan Shit and deputy manager Raja Chakraborty were charged with culpable homicide
not amounting to murder and violations of fire-safety norms.
Countering Amit Shah’s claims, Trinamool general secretary Abhishek Banerjee said it was “unfortunate that the BJP was venturing into vulture politics over dead bodies”. Abhishek added: “If the state government is responsible for the deaths in Anandapur, then the BJP should own responsibility for 140 deaths in Bengal during the SIR process.”