3 women buried alive as land sinks at coalfield in Jharkhand’s Dhanbad district

Dhanbad Deputy Commissioner Varun Ranjan said, “The incident happened yesterday and the police and the administration rushed to the spot. We have recovered one body. However, parts of the two bodies have been taken out and the NDRF is on the spot to get the remaining parts.”

Asked whether the women had gone to relieve themselves due to lack of toilets when the incident happened, Ranjan said, “We are not aware of this.”

The residents have to be relocated as per the Jharia master plan and work is progressing on that front, Ranjan added.

As per the Ministry of Coal’s website, there is a problem of subsidence in the Jharia coalfields, which has been blamed on “unscientific mining carried out by the erstwhile mine owners over more than 200 years of operations prior to nationalisation”.

The local administration had declared the areas unsafe for habitation, after which a high-level committee was set up in 1996. Based on its recommendations, a master plan was developed including plans to deal with fire, subsidence and rehabilitation and “diversion of surface infrastructure within the leasehold areas of ECL (Eastern Coalfield Limited) and BCCL (Bharat Coking Coal Limited)”. However, the process of rehabilitation has not been completed.