Ahmedabad: Banaskantha police on Sunday evening arrested one more accused in the Deesa blast case that claimed 22 lives, including eight children. The arrest confirmed a close link with a similar blast in Harda in Feb 2024, which killed 11 people, said police.
The police arrested Harish Meghwani, 35, from Indore in Madhya Pradesh. He was a labour contractor who gave a sub-contract to Laxmi Nayak and Pankaj Nayak, who died in the blast at the Deesa firecracker godown on April 1.
“In connection with the blast at Deepak Firecracker’s warehouse in Deesa, police have arrested Harish Meghwani, a resident of Treasure Town Society in the Bijalpur area of Indore,” read a police statement. Earlier, the cops arrested the warehouse owners, Khoobchand Mohanani and his son Deepak Mohanani, in connection with the blast and booked them for culpable homicide not amounting to murder.
According to police, interrogation revealed that Meghwani, along with Laxmi and Pankaj, were well acquainted with each other.
“Meghwani, Laxmi, and Pankaj visited the location and deemed it suitable for manufacturing sutli (string-based) firecrackers. Subsequently, labourers (who later died in the blast) were repeatedly brought from Harda to work in the Deepak Firecracker warehouse at Deesa for financial gain,” said the police statement.
Sources in the police said that Laxmi, Pankaj, and Meghwani shifted the labourers (who died in the blast) from Harda to Deesa just two days before the tragedy took place.
“At least 20 of the deceased labourers worked with a firecracker factory in Harda, and the same set of people and the entire factory network was shifted to Deesa where another blast took place, killing 22 people,” said a police officer.