Two men were arrested on Sunday morning for alleged negligence that police suspect had led to the death of two persons who had fallen into an oil tanker at a soap manufacturing unit on Saturday.
Among the two was the store superviser at the soap manufacturing unit.
The two have been identified as Amit Chakraborty, the store superviser, and K. Kumar, driver of the oil tanker in which a labourer of the unit and a helper travelling in the tanker had fallen.
Police said the accused have been charged under Section 304A of the Indian Penal Code, which deals with the offence of causing death due to negligence.
The accident happened on the premises of 7 Tiljala Road, a soap manufacturing unit, when a 24,000-litre oil tanker was being unloaded. The tanker contained neem oil, which is one of the ingredients of soaps.
The police said a man who was apparently trying to measure the volume of the oil by bending over slipped and fell inside the tanker. Another man who reportedly saw the other person disappear through the top cover of the tanker tried to help his colleague and, instead, landed in the oil.
It was only after some time that employees and others realised that the two were missing. They alerted the police. Almost two hours later, a joint team of the disaster management group, police and the fire brigade managed to pull the two out of the oil tanker.
They were later identified as Loganathan, 33, who was from Bangalore, and Kartick Halder, 43, who was from Sonarpur. Halder was a labourer at the unit, while Loganathan was a helper in the tanker.
Their bodies were sent for post-mortem. "A preliminary post-mortem report revealed the two died of asphyxia," said a police officer.
"There was no supervision when the volume of oil inside the huge tanker was being measured. Had there been supervision, the tragedy might have been averted," said an officer at Lalbazar.
