Hundreds of local people, angry with the disaster caused by the styrene gas leak on the early hours of Thursday that caused 12 deaths and hospitalisation of around 1,000 persons, stormed the factory premises on Saturday and demanded that the company that stores and deals with hazardous stuff be shifted elsewhere or shut down immediately.
Visakhapatnam’s police had a tough time in preventing the angry crowds that gathered outside gates of the LG Polymers compound since morning and had to use mild lathicharge to control them. Still, more people gathered around by noon and stormed into the factory premises and roughed up some of the insiders, mostly lowly placed works. The public anger hasn’t died down even two days after the disaster that resulted in massive panic and loss of life and cattle. By Saturday morning, at least 350 persons are still in the hospital, while hundreds are placed in rehabilitation camps outside their homes. At least four patients are in critical stage, while others are out of danger.
Continuous rumours of gas leaking again on Thursday and Friday nights have panicked people who are scared of returning homes. Andhra Pradesh Chief Secretary Neelam Sahani and DGP Gautam Sawang and several local ministers and officials are camping in Visakhapatnam and monitoring the situation. DGP Sawang on Saturday afternoon declared that things returned to normalcy. He said that the police are ready to help return of people to their homes by Sunday or Monday and, meanwhile, they would be provided with shelter and food at camps. Tourism Minister M. Srinivasa Rao, who hails from Visakhapatnam along with other ministers Kanna Babu and Jairam, have tried to calm down villagers of RR Venkatapuram, adjacent to LG Polymers.
However, their efforts proved futile as there has been a great trust deficit between the locals and the LG management. “How can we trust the company which never cared for our welfare or safety? Why there was no siren blown when the gas leaked? Not even a single person from the company visited us till now and cared about our lives,” asked Ramana Rao, a villager arrested by the police. Several villagers told TV channels that LG Polymers has never arranged a single medial camp to them in the last two decades after it took over the plant from UB Breweries in 1997. Many private companies in Visakhapatnam are known to conduct medical camps for locals, but LG Polymers had never done it, allege the villagers. Several women cried before police that they would never allow the company to work from the same location.
In a letter addressed to Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy on Thursday, Sharma, who champions environmental causes, alleged that LG Polymers had never cared to follow industrial safety norms in the last two decades. He demanded that the styrene gas based plant should be immediately shifted or shut for the safety of people. However, the Andhra Pradesh government is in a dilemma on taking a decision immediately on this issue. “We are waiting for a high-level panel from the Central government by Saturday. We can only take a stand on the public demand after that,” said Minister Srinivas Rao. He urged the public not to take law into their hands.
Former Chief Minister and TDP president N. Chandrababu Naidu on Saturday wrote a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi seeking setting up of a high-level scientific committee to probe the gas leak disaster. “The cases booked by the state police are mild in nature. How can a disaster of this magnitude be probed by a panel of IAS officers? We need an in-depth central investigation,” said Naidu.