Three workers have died from an oxygen cylinder blast at a cement plant in India’s Chhattisgarh State. The accident occurred at a cement plant in Himri village of Baloda Bazar district, run by one of India’s leading cement manufacturing companies, UltraTech Cement, on July 18. Two other workers sustained critical injuries in the explosion. A similar accident took place in Telangana’s Suryapet district on July 25, in which one worker lost his life.
The deceased in Chhattisgarh have been identified as Lakesh Kumar Gayakwad (21), Shatruhan Lal Verma (27), and Umesh Kumar Verma (26). All of them were hired by a private company as contract workers to carry out pipeline-related repair work at the plant.
Families of the victims have accused the management of not adhering to safety protocols, which led to the accident. Activists also criticize the overall process of outsourcing operations, which increases the risk of safety procedures being compromised. The families of the workers staged protests blaming the plant management for the negligence and seeking fair compensation.
Nearly 83% of workers in the Indian cement industry work in precarious conditions, according to the Indian National Cement Workers Federation (INCWF). INCWF General Secretary Deoraj Singh expressed grief at the tragedy and said that there was a critical need to limit precarious employment in the industry and increase permanent jobs. He added that UltraTech’s management must implement stringent measures to improve workplace safety, particularly for contract workers, to prevent such incidents from taking place again.
Contract workers face difficulty in unionizing and are vulnerable to labor contractors who pressure them to work in unsafe conditions by dangling higher wages.
At present, India has 154 large cement plants in operation, which is the second highest after China, employing 135,000 workers, according to a report by People’s Union for Democratic Rights.
According to Global IndustriALL, at least 10 similar accidents were reported from cement factories in India in 2022, in which at least nine workers lost their lives and 29 were injured. In 2021, 21 workers were killed and 20 more injured in at least 17 such accidents. This latest tragedy has again underscored the importance of ensuring workplace safety.
