The National Green Tribunal (NGT) has taken suo motu cognizance of a news item published on January 25, 2025, regarding a massive explosion at the ordnance factory Bhandara (OFBA) near Nagpur, Maharashtra, resulting in the death of eight workers and injuries to five others.
The NGT’s Principal Bench in New Delhi registered an original application to address the matter.
The tribunal noted that the blast occurred in a unit manufacturing low-temperature plastic explosives (LTPE), where 13 workers, including two apprentices, were present at the time.
The explosion’s magnitude was so immense that it reduced the facility to rubble, trapping workers beneath the debris.
The NGT observed that the blast’s intensity was so severe that it propelled metal fragments over half a kilometer away from the site, with eyewitnesses reporting a massive fireball visible from up to 3 kilometers away.
The factory, now under Pune-based Munitions India Limited (MIL), is a key defense unit producing high-energy explosives like RDX and HMX for various ammunition types.
The tribunal relied on its previous orders in similar cases where it had granted compensation to the victims’ families.
The NGT also cited its order where it had directed payment of compensation to the extent of Rs. 20 lakhs to the families of the deceased victims.
The Principal Bench of Chairperson Justice Prakash Shrivastava, Judicial Member Justice Arun Kumar Tyagi and Expert Member Dr Afroz Ahmad impleaded several respondents, including the Directorate of Industrial Safety and Health, Maharashtra State, the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB), the Maharashtra Pollution Control Board (MPCB), the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC), Munitions India Limited, and the District Magistrate (DM), Nagpur.
The tribunal directed the respondents to file their responses/replies by way of affidavit before the Western Zonal Bench of the NGT.
The matter has been transferred to the Western Zonal Bench, Pune, for further action, with the next date of hearing scheduled for April 4, 2025.
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