Kochi: City Police Commissioner K Sethuraman will submit the preliminary report on the recent fire at the Brahmapuram solid waste treatment plant to the government on Monday. The report will be forwarded to the Chief Secretary through the State Police Chief.
Sources say the police investigation couldn't unravel any conspiracy behind the eruption of fire that raged on for nearly a fortnight and it was found to have been triggered by natural factors.
The police collected and examined the CCTV footage at the plant and took the statements of the employees of the plant who were present at the time of the fire outbreak. They also checked the phone call records of those who were at Brahmapuram or nearby areas. Over 50 people were also quizzed.
The police also took into account the satellite images of the Brahmapuram waste treatment plant and nearby areas of the day when the fire was first spotted.
The probe found that there were conducive factors for the fire to break out on a summer day. The presence of methane in the garbage helped to inflame and spread the fire.
If the fire was man-made it was unlikely to have occurred again as happened in Brahmapuram when garbage heaps caught fire sporadically, the report states.
The investigation was carried out under the leadership of P V Baby, Assistant Commissioner of Police, Thrikkakara.
The Infopark police had registered a case over the incident which endangered the air quality over Kochi and surrounding areas until the fire was doused by firefighters working day and night.
Meanwhile, another fire erupted in the garbage mounds at Brahmapuram on Sunday nearly two weeks after the fire was quelled.
