Ammo dump blast at army camp kills 1, injures 7

An explosion in the ammunition dump of Indian Army’s base camp in Unchi Bassi near Dasuya on Jalandhar-Pathankot highway on Tuesday killed a technician and injuring at least seven other members of the inspecting team from Ordnance Factories Jabalpur.

The blast occurred around 3.30 pm when a team from Ordnance Factory was inspecting the ammunition as a routine procedure, police officials of the district said.

The deceased has been identified as Ajay Pandey, a technician, who is said to be from Madhya Pradesh. His body has been kept in the Dasuya civil hospital mortuary. As per information, while nine who were injured include a Subedar rank Army official whereas rests were non-commissioned officers.

Injured Anurag, Malkan Praj- apat and Baljinder Singh were ru- shed to Dasuya civil hospital whereas Parvendra Singh and Kuldip Singh were shifted to Capitol hospital in Jalandhar, where they are in serious condition.

Subedar Davinder Singh, who brought the body to the civil hospital in Dasuya said that two more injured had been admitted to military hospital Pathankot.

No army officer was available for comments. The public relation wing of the camp, feigned ignorance about the incident. The army men who were attending on the injured refused to talk to the media. Defence spokesperson at Chandigarh, Anil Gour, when contacted, expressed helplessness in giving any details pertaining to the accident.

Senior superintendent of police, Hoshiapur, J Elanchazhian too said he had no official word from any of the army officials regarding the incident .

“What we have gathered is that a team from the Ordnance factory was on an annual inspection since about a week. As the blast took place inside the army camp, the police were neither called on the spot nor any details were shared with us”, he said.