3 workers asphyxiated at KGF

Nagendrababu, 26, Ravi, 29 and Kutti Prasad, 35, all residents of Telugu Line in KGF, are the dead, police said.

Anandraj, a worker at the Bharat Earth Movers Limited, had given a contract for clearing the septic tank for Rs 10,000 to a group of seven members and made an advance payment of Rs 1,500. The three, who had got into the pit, inhaled the poisonous gas and died on the spot.

On seeing the three collapse, the four other workers fled. Later, fire force personnel rushed to the spot and recovered the bodies of the victims from the pit.

DSP Devajyoti Ray, Assistant Commissioner R S Peddappaiah and Bangarpet tahsildar S M Mangala visited the spot. But the families of the three didn’t allow the police to shift the bodies for post-mortem. Padma, an activist, insisted that the bodies couldn’t be shifted till the members of some organisations arrived at the spot.

The members of the organisations staged a protest stating that Deputy Commissioner Manoj Kumar Meena should announce compensation to the victims’ families. They refused to withdraw the protest even when the DC arrived at the spot around 7:30 pm.