A college student was killed, at least two others were injured and two more went missing when explosives apparently hidden at a dumping zone on the Hooghly riverbank adjacent to Jagannath ghat area of Halisahar town in North 24-Parganas exploded around 3.30pm on Thursday.

The incident occurred when Sumit Singh, 19, a BCom student of Barrackpore Surendranath College, along with a few other boys, was playing cricket on a ground adjacent to the ghat, and went to find a ball that had got lost in the dumping zone.

In the massive explosion that followed, Sumit was fatally injured. Doctors at Golghar hospital declared him dead on arrival. Two other boys, whose names are not known, and were critically injured, were admitted to the hospital.

Local residents claimed that at least two other teenagers, Rohit Singh and Rohit Chowdhury, were missing since the blast occurred and fear they might have been thrown into the river under the impact of the blast.

Till late Thursday evening, the two Rohits were traceless.

The impact of the blast was so strong that it created a 3-foot-deep crater on the bank of the Hooghly bank and also uprooted a tree.

“It was a massive explosion, something similar to the one on January 9, 2020, that occurred at Navigation Ramghat when police personnel were defusing explosives confiscated from illegal fireworks units,” said Avinash Singh, a local resident, who had been playing cards near the ghat when the explosion occurred on Thursday. Avinash added there were at least two major blasts that made him and others rush to the site where they saw Sumit and the two other boys lying in a heap.

Sumit Singh. File photo

Police officers, including Barrackpore police commissioner Manoj Verma, rushed to the spot and began a probe. However, till Thursday evening the nature of the explosion could not be confirmed.

“All aspects are being examined. We heard that two persons are missing, which is also being investigated,” Verma told reporters.

An officer of Bijpur police station suspected that explosives for making bombs were most probably hidden under the tree at the isolated spot.

“It was not an ordinary bomb explosion. Goons must have hidden raw materials for making bombs. The explosion got triggered when the boys went to the place to search for the cricket ball,” the police officer said.