Hyderabad: 1 die, 2 hurt in Gulf Oil Corporation blast

Hyderabad: In an untoward incident, an employee working with the Gulf Oil Corporation Limited (GOCL) at Kukatpally died on the spot and two others received serious injuries in the detonator blast in the company in the wee hours on Wednesday.

The blast sent shivers among the locals in and around the company premises. The deceased was identified as Vasudev Sharma, 62, a resident of Uppal.

"When the blast took place, the deceased was very close to the detonator, so he died on spot, while the other two Padma Rao, 60 and Raju, 51, were in the same premises, but were little away from the detonator, so they sustained severe injuries and other two persons, M Harikanth, 38 and Naveen Kumar, 35, received minor injuries," Inspector of Police, Kukatpally, B Laxminarayana Reddy said. The incident took place in Block No 46C of GOCL.

All the injured were shifted to ESI hospital and are undergoing treatment. The exact cause of blast is not yet known, but the investigation is going on and once the investigation is completed, relevant sections against the company will be framed," the Inspector said.

This is not just one of the incidents. This unit has a history of about four such incidents in past 17 years. At that time, it was popularly known as IDL industries.

IDL Explosives is a subsidiary of Gulf Oil Corporation Ltd. and the company is in the business of manufacturing bulk explosive products.

In a similar blast that took place on February 23, 2015, two people died. According to local people, two years ago, also about 12 persons died in a blast but still the management did not enhance the safety measures.

They said they made several representations to the authorities to shift the unit from there but there has been no positive response so far.