Raziul Islam left his home from Magurmari in Meghalaya’s West Garo Hills to travel to the dangerous coal mines in East Jaintia Hills as he wanted to fund his college education.

Islam is one of the seven miners who hail from Magurmari and Phershakandi villages under Rajabala constituency.

The seven miners, along with eight others, have been trapped in a coal mine at Ksan under Saipung police station since December 13. Of the eight others, three are locals from a village near the mine while five are from neighbouring Assam.

There is no word till now about the fate of these miners. According to Rajabala legislator Azad Zaman, who met the families of the seven miners, the families are hopeful that at least the “bodies” of their loved ones could be retrieved for them to be able to perform the last rites.

On December 13, around 8.30am, the miners reportedly were dropped inside the mine. Zaman was the one who alerted the East Jaintia Hills district administration about the mishap. “I received calls from the victims’ families around 10am on December 13 after they were informed by others from the site about the mishap. I then alerted the district administration,” Zaman recalled.

The Congress legislator said the miners’ families are looking for strong financial support, as the miners were the sole bread winners.

The district administration had sanctioned Rs 1 lakh each to the next of kin of the miners as interim relief.

Zaman said he is working towards transferring the money to West Garo Hills to save the family members from having to travel right up to East Jaintia Hills, a distance over 300km, to claim the amount.

He said the state revenue and disaster management has to give its approval for transferring the money to West Garo Hills.

“I met all the family members of the seven miners, and they told me that they want the government to at least trace the bodies, and hand them over so that they can perform the last rites. Their hopes of seeing their loved ones alive have diminished,” Zaman said over phone from Rajabala.

Raziul Islam, according to Zaman, had wanted to continue his science studies.

But since his family was unable to support him financially, he decided to earn and save some money so that he would be in a position to resume his studies at Rajabala. He said Islam had completed his higher secondary examination in the science stream.

Search operations

From Ksan, where the search and rescue operations have been on since December 13, official spokesperson R. Susngi said on Sunday that the personnel of the Odisha fire and disaster management services operated two pumps from two old mines located near the main shaft where the 15 miners are stuck.

The operation came to a halt at 5pm, and the water level from both the old shafts reduced by 4 feet. However, he said because of heavy seepage from another shaft/river, the water level went up again.

“We could bring down the water level only by 2 feet. A total 1,215,000 litres of water has so far been pumped out from both the shafts,” Susngi said.

Earlier, he said the high-powered pumps of the Pune-based Kirloskar Brothers Limited had to be stopped from operating at the main shaft owing to a technical snag.

Similarly, pumps of Coal India Limited suffered glitches.