Lucknow: The death toll in the NTPC boiler blast in Raebareli has risen to 32 with more injured workers succumbing to burn injuries.
Doctors have said that the toll was likely to rise further as more than a dozen contractual laborers were battling for life with more than 90 per cent burn wounds.
Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi was among the first politicians to reach Raebareli.
Mr Gandhi visited the post-mortem house where he met the families of those who have lost their lives, then went to the district hospital where he met the injured persons and finally to the site of the incident.
Mr Gandhi, accompanied by senior Congress leader Ghulam Nabi Azad and UPCC president Raj Babbar, had cut short his tour in Gujarat to visit Raebareli which is his mother and Congress president Sonia Gandhi’s parliamentary constituency.
Mr Gandhi said that he wanted a fair probe into the incident and government jobs for the kin of those who had lost their lives.
Mr Ghulam Nabi Azad demanded a judicial probe into the incident. “It is an unfortunate incident and we do not wish to politicize it but there must be an independent probe into the lapses that led to the blast,” he said.
Union minister of state for power R.K. Singh and UP power minister Shrikant Sharma also reached Raebareli.
A technical team from NTPC also arrived at the accident site on Thursday to investigate the cause of the incident.
A magisterial inquiry has also been ordered by the district magistrate, Sanjay Khatri.
