A breach at Reliance's Sasan Ultra Mega Power Project in Madhya Pradesh's Singrauli has left a 35-year-old man and an eight-year-old boy dead and four others missing. Reportedly, a breakage in the ash dump yard wall of the power plant pushed water from a nearby reservoir and swept away nearby houses on Friday.
A team of 30 members of the National Disaster Response Force or NDRF is involved in the search operation for other villagers. "So far two bodies of an eight-year-old boy and a 35-year-old man have been recovered from the ash slurry, around seven km away towards the border with Uttar Pradesh," said Singrauli District Collector K.V.S. Chaudhary. "Four more persons including the boy's sister, 9, his mother, and the 35-year-three-year-old man's son are still missing," he added. The bodies of the two were found at a distance from the breach site. Those swept away were inside their houses, near the pond, at the time of the incident.
The victims were swept up in a flow of fly ash, which travelled at least six kilometres, swallowing up whole agricultural fields along the way. “The sludge flowed from the dyke and then mixed with a stream, which carried it further,” Chaudhary had said earlier in the day. Fly ash is a powdery byproduct of burning pulverised coal.
“The injured have been hospitalised and their condition is stable. The relief work is going on a war footing. A survey will be conducted to provide compensation to the villagers and action will be taken against those responsible for the incident,” the Hindustan Times reported citing Chaudhary.
The project, owned by Anil Ambani's Reliance Power, is 780 kilometres northeast of the state capital of Bhopal. Singrauli houses various power projects, including NTPC, Coal India, Reliance Power and Essar Power. This is the third such incident in the district within a year.
“We are deeply anguished by the incident involving the break in the ash dump yard wall at our Sasan Power Plant… We are investigating the reasons underlying the incident. The power plant operations will continue as the relief and restoration work is not affected by the same,” Sasan Power said in a statement.
