A man and his seven-year-old son were killed on the spot when a bagful of firecrackers they were carrying on their two-wheeler accidentally exploded on Thursday.
The deadly explosion on Diwali took place at 1.35pm near Chinna Kottakuppam, between Puducherry and Tamil Nadu’s Villupuram district.
V Kalainesan, 37, a resident of Ariyankuppam town in Puducherry, was returning with his son on their Yamaha scooter from Koonimedu village in Tamil Nadu, when the pack of firecrackers accidentally went off.
CCTV visuals purportedly showing the accident were circulating on Friday.
“Three other [men] who were nearby were injured, but they are out of danger,” said Villupuram’s superintendent of police, N Shreenatha.
They were being treated at the Jawaharlal Institute of Postgraduate Medical Education and Research (JIPMER) in Puducherry for injuries.
A police officer, who recalled the episode, said Kalainesan had picked up two bags of country-made firecrackers from Puducherry on Wednesday and kept them at his mother-in-law’s place in Koonimedu. On Thursday, the father-son duo loaded one of the bags onto their scooter and was heading back towards Puducherry when the firecrackers exploded on way.
“The scooter was blown to pieces while both of them died on the spot,” the police officer said.
Their bodies were sent to Pondicherry Institute of Medical Sciences (PIMS) for post mortem.
The deputy superintendent of Kottakuppam police station, B Arun said that the case has been filed against the deceased and his father-in-law who is the owner of the house where he stored the crackers. “The crackers are made in Puducherry. Though it is a licensed unit, these crackers are mostly banned and are far from the approved green crackers.”