The Chasnala mining disaster was a disaster that happened on 27 December 1975 in a coal mine in
Chasnala
Chasnala is a neighbourhood in Dhanbad in Dhanbad subdivision of Dhanbad district in the Indian state of Jharkhand.
Geography
Location
Chasnala is located at .
Note: The map alongside presents some of the notable locations in the area. All p ...
near
Dhanbad
Dhanbad is the second-most populated city in the Indian state of Jharkhand after Jamshedpur. It ranks as the 42nd largest city in India and is the 33rd largest million-plus urban agglomeration in India. Dhanbad shares its land borders with Pa ...
in the
India
India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...
n state of
Jharkhand
Jharkhand (; ; ) is a state in eastern India. The state shares its border with the states of West Bengal to the east, Chhattisgarh to the west, Uttar Pradesh to the northwest, Bihar to the north and Odisha to the south. It has an area of . It ...
. An explosion in the mine followed by
flooding
A flood is an overflow of water ( or rarely other fluids) that submerges land that is usually dry. In the sense of "flowing water", the word may also be applied to the inflow of the tide. Floods are an area of study of the discipline hydrolog ...
killed 375 miners.
Accident
The disaster was caused by an explosion at 1:35pm that weakened the wall between the mine pit and another, abandoned mine above it that was full of water.
By one estimate at the time, around of water flooded in, at a rate of minute.
Other reports put the total amount of water at .
The miners were killed by debris, drowning, and the force of the flood. By the time bodies could be recovered, they were typically identifiable only by the number on their lamp helmets.
The first body was recovered 26 days after the accident occurred.
With a death toll of 375, Chasnala was India's deadliest
mining accident
A mining accident is an accident that occurs during the process of mining minerals or metals. Thousands of miners die from mining accidents each year, especially from underground coal mining, although accidents also occur in hard rock mining. C ...
.
Investigation and consequences
The Indian Iron and Steel Company (IISCO), which owned the mine, said it conformed to international standards. Miners blamed management negligence. There was also concern that the barrier between the two mines had been unsafely thin and that there was inadequate safety equipment. In particular, the mine had no high pressure pump.
Instead, pumps had to be brought in from the Soviet Union and Poland to try to remove the water.
, the former Chief Justice of the
Patna High Court
The Patna High Court is the High Court of the state of Bihar. It was established on 9 February 1916 and later affiliated under the Government of India Act 1915.
The court is based in Patna, the administrative capital of the state of Bihar, ...
, was appointed to investigate the circumstances of the disaster. He submitted his report on 24 March 1977. Consequently, four IISCO officials were prosecuted for negligence. By the time the case was decided in 2012 (37 years later), two of them had died. The surviving officials, manager Ramanuj Bhattacharya and agent, planning and group security officer Dipak Sarkar, were each sentenced to one year's imprisonment and a fine of ₹5,000. They were released on bail and had a month to appeal.
A memorial to the dead (Shaheed Smarak) was built outside the mine entrance and moved to a park in 1997.
In popular culture
The film ''
Kaala Patthar
''Kaala Patthar'' () is a 1979 Indian Hindi-language action drama film produced and directed by Yash Chopra, with a screenplay written by Salim–Javed. The film was based on the Chasnala mining disaster, and is the fourth collaboration betw ...
'' depicts the tragedy.
See also
*
2018 Meghalaya mining accident
References
{{coord missing, Jharkhand
Coal mining disasters in India
1975 in India
Mining disasters in India
History of Jharkhand (1947–present)
Disasters in Jharkhand
Dhanbad district
1975 disasters in India
Mining in Jharkhand