11 June, Kathmandu. On 24 February 2080, at around 12 noon, two people brought a cylinder-shaped iron object to City Safari at Rohit Workshop in Nijgadh Municipality-7 Bara.
Ramesh Jaiswal and his employee Rakesh Jaiswal, who were running the Kawad factory in Nijgarh-9, brought it to the workshop saying that they could not remove the brass from its mouth.
Resham Zarga Magar, the owner of the workshop, was using gas welding to remove the brass on the iron tip, which was one foot long and weighed 12 kg. At that time there was a loud explosion.
Workshop owner Magar, 20-year-old employee Ritu Rajak and 35-year-old Rakesh Jaiswal, who worked at the Kawad factory, died during treatment. Workshop mechanic, 34-year-old Indian citizen Feroze Dewan, 46-year-old Surya Bahadur Thapa of Nijgarh-5, Arabind Shah and others were injured.
During the investigation, the police arrested 40-year-old Ramesh Prasad Jaiswal, alias Raj, who was operating a kawad factory in the name of Mahalakshmi Enterprises, 29-year-old Tikaram Pakhrin of Nijgarh-9, Bara, 40-year-old Vasu Tamang, 40-year-old Shivshankar Shah of Sarlahi and 47-year-old Wilt Mahato alias Wiltu.
The murder case against them is pending in the District Court, Bara. But what happened to Rohit Workshop? What is the source of the powerful explosion? The police did not investigate that.
‘The family ran from this workshop, the father didn’t stay either. Everything has been suppressed’, says Rohit, the son of workshop owner Resham.
Items stolen from the truck by the driver and co-driver
According to the statement given by Ramesh Jaiswal, owner of Kawad, who went to Rohit Workshop with the burnt items, on February 14, Tikaram Pakhrin and another woman came on a motorcycle and said that they had 2 quintals of iron.
‘There was talk of selling at the rate of 45 rupees per kg. Later, Rakesh Jaiswal, who works in the factory, took a city rickshaw and brought iron to his house’, Tikaram said, ‘1 quintal of iron was 28 kg.
Among them, the cylinder-shaped object has a brass connection in the mouth, so he went to the workshop to remove it even after hitting it with a hammer. The police arrested Tikaram Pakhrin after Ramesh’s statement.
According to District Police Office Bara, four months before the incident, Pakhrin was working as a co-driver in the truck No. 5 Kha 9727.
“That truck is usually loaded with corrugated goods, while unloading at the steel company, some pieces of iron used to remain in the vehicle”, he says, “The iron driver Vasu Tamang and I used to take it home.”
He said that they used to collect the iron taken out of the vehicle and sell it after it was too much. He said that the cylinder-like item was extracted from the goods of New Scrap Firm in Birendra Bazar in Dhanusha.
About 38 tons of iron pieces were loaded on the truck to be delivered to Ashok Steel. While taking the goods, I and the driver took out about 50 kilos in Nijgarh market’, he told the police, ‘at that time we also took out an object like a cylinder.’
Later, he admitted that when he needed money to pay installments in the bank, he consulted with Tamang and sold 138 kg of iron with brass fittings.
The driver of the truck, Vasu Tamang, also revealed that he did not know how the item exploded even though he wanted to sell it.
‘That was iron brought from New Scrap Firm. But I didn’t know that it was an explosive substance’, he said, ‘I came to know that it was an explosive substance only after the incident.’
On the basis of his statement, Shiv Shankar Sah, the owner of New Scrap Firm located in Ganeshman Charnath Municipality-4, Dhanusha, who was arrested, disclosed that he had brought and sold the object like an exploded cylinder to his firm by collecting the cardboard material and bringing it to his firm on 28th of November 2080.
“That cylinder-shaped object that looks like iron was about 1 foot long and weighed 12 kg”, he said, “I bought that object from Mahato at the rate of 50 rupees per kg by paying 600 rupees.”
He said that he came to know only after the arrival of the police that the goods were stolen when they were sent to Ashok Steel for sale. Mahato, who comes with the explosive goods, revealed that he used to go to the village houses and collect the explosives and sell them.
“I came to know about the explosion incident only after the police came to the house and questioned me. I found the same while collecting kawad in the village,” says Biltu.
During the investigation, it was found that he bought the same with 13-year-old Saroj Pariyar, son of Kamal Pariyar. During the interrogation by the police, Kamal revealed that he found an iron-like object buried in the sand when he went for a walk in the river to the north of the village.
He said, “I brought the money I got from selling Kawad Lane to my house and hid it in the bush. Later, when I saw Kawad bringing books from the village, I told him that there was iron.”
He said that after he said he would take it, he put the iron in a sack and brought it. Pariyar said that Wiltu gave 300 rupees for that. “I used that money to eat hot and fruity”, he said.
The court released everyone on bail
Based on the police investigation, during the hearing of the case registered in the District Court Bara, the bench of Judge Jagannath Paudel ordered that the case be released on bail, saying that there was no need to keep the case in jail.
According to the order, Pakhrin, Tamang, Shah and Mahato have been released after paying a bond of one lakh rupees. But Rohit, the son of the deceased Magar, says that the police did not seriously investigate the incident in which three people died.
“How can the explosive material reach the people who pick up and transport the Kawadi goods?”, he asked, “Why and how was the explosion that killed three people declared an unknown object found carelessly?”
It is said that HE (1F0105) was found written on an object that looked like a piece of kit from the workshop at the scene of the incident which was submitted to the court by the police. According to a former officer of the Nepali Army, looking at the photos of the incident site and the details mentioned in the warrant, it seems that explosives have been detonated.
“HE stands for High Explosive, if a child finds it in a bugger, it could be an explosive substance left behind during the conflict,” he said.
Some have suspected that the explosive material used in the work of the Terai-Madhesh-Kathmandu Expressway, which is being built in coordination with the Nepali Army, may have reached Kawad and exploded. But the police investigation does not seem to have entered into this matter.
