The Mizoram Police have arrested one person who allegedly lit a lighter in the middle of the road near a tanker that claimed 11 lives in the Turial area of Aizawl district in the state.
According to the police, at 4:35 pm on 29 October, one tanker carrying 22,000 litres of petrol that was supposed to be delivered at Champhai met with an accident within the vicinity of Tuirial Airfield by turning turtle on the main road, thus spilling petrol out onto the surface of the road. A lot of people had gathered to collect and store the spilt petrol when it suddenly caught fire around 5.50 p.m., and four people lost their lives on the spot. After the injured people were immediately taken to various hospitals for treatment, the police party and fire tenders arrived on the scene to extinguish the raging fire.
“The Place of Occurrence (PO) was minutely inspected with the help of the FSL (Forensic Science Laboratory) Team. Prima facie, it appeared that the cause of the accident the truck was rash and negligent driving on the part of the driver and when the people started collecting the spilling petrol, someone apparently lit a lighter or was smoking, etc., which ignited the highly inflammable petrol, resulting in the very unfortunate and tragic accident leading to loss and severe burn injuries to precious human lives,” the police said in its statement.
Bawngkawn Police immediately proceeded with the investigation and based on the information from a reliable source, the police arrested one person identified as TBC Lallawmawma (28) of the Tuirial at midnight of 1 November.
“During sustained interrogation, the accused admitted his guilt on the morning of 2.11.2022 at about 11:00 am, stating that on a fateful day, he went to collect the spilling petrol from the Tank Lorry; however, as there was a huge crowd engaged in collecting the spilling petrol and due to the chaos, he was unable to get enough petrol. Infuriated, he came out in the middle of the road and lit a lighter and exposed it to a plastic water bottle containing some quantity of petrol collected by him and being carried by him, just to test whether it could burn or not,” the police said.
As the petrol caught fire, he threw the burning bottle on the ground which eventually resulted in the big fire accident, it added.