Eleven people were injured in an LPG cylinder blast in a house in the Nanakramguda area of Gachibowli in Hyderabad on Tuesday, November 23, police said. The injured were admitted to the government-run Gandhi Hospital, where the condition of two of them is stated to be critical. According to reports, there were around 50 people when the cylinder exploded early on Tuesday morning. All of the residents are labourers from Uttar Pradesh and Bihar, and 11 among them sustained burn injuries. Nanakramguda is located close to the Financial District in Cyberabad, where many major multinational companies have their offices.
Due to the impact of the explosion, the ground floor of the two-storeyed house was totally damaged. Disaster Response Force personnel and police rushed to the spot and launched a rescue and relief operation.
“The incident took place around 5 in the morning in an independent house at Nanakramguda village near the Hanuman temple. There are several labourers hailing from north Indian states who work as labourers in construction and electricity sectors. One of the residents at the house switched on the light, triggering the blast, as a gas cylinder was leaking already,” a police official told the media. The police registered a case and took up further investigation.
According to a report in The Hindu, the gas cylinder that exploded was a commercial one and the police are probing why a commercial cylinder was being used in a residential area. Speaking to the Hindu, a police officer said that the labourers seemed to have forgotten to turn off the cylinder, leading to a leakage. A labourer turning on the fan or the light could have been enough to create a spark and lead to an explosion, the police added.
The report further states that the Gachibowli police and fire personnel received a call about the explosion at 5.10 am, and rushed to spot. A fire tender was rushed into service though there was no fire reported. Some houses around the independent house have developed cracks due to the impact of the explosion, police added.
With IANS inputs