Three edible oil company owners sent to remand; factory did not have licence
Kakinada: Three owners of the Ambati Subbanna Edible oil Company and its supervisor, arrested on Saturday, were remanded to 14 days’ judicial custody when they were produced before the Peddapuram Magistrate Court on Sunday.
The three were Singavarapu Viswanath (43) and Singavarapu Raghuram (36) while the supervisor was Akkireddy Srinivas alias Vasu (42).
The court heard that the owners did not take clearances/permission from the Factories department for running the company. The investigation officer of Peddapuram police station as also the joint committee headed by the joint collector have found this out in their preliminary inquiry. The company has not observed or followed any safety norms, resulting in the death of an employee, they said.
According to the committee report and as per the safety norms, if a worker gets into the oil tank to clean the sludge at the bottom, he should hold onto a safety belt. Two workers should hold the belt of the worker from the top. “After some time, if any problem arises, the workers who hold the belt atop the tanker should pull him out of the tanker.”
The rule also stipulates that the worker who gets into a tanker should be provided with an oxygen cylinder. There should be holes at the tankers to get free air but the factory did not provide such holes.
The factory has to appoint skilled workers who are qualified in the necessary fields to take care for the workers. “But, there are no skilled workers in the factory.”
Peddapuram DSP Murali Mohan said the workers who died in the industrial accident were unskilled. “As no licence was taken from the concerned departments to run the factory and unskilled workers were employed, the arrest of the owners and others were made," the court was told.
However, many issues cropped up relating to the industrial accident. In the past, though such accidents occurred in Kakinada and in the vicinity of the city, no industrial owner had been arrested. In this case, such arrests were made. Police explained that in the previous cases, the companies had proper licences.
