Nearly one-and-a-half month after the collapse of chimney at a power plant near here, the police on Monday arrested three senior officials of Vedanta Resources-controlled Bharat Aluminium Company Ltd (BALCO) in connection with the accident. The accident had claimed at least 41 lives at BALCO Nagar on September 23.

BALCO vice-president and project manager Viral Mehta, assistant general manager (Project) Deepak Narang and graduate trainee engineer Anoop Mahapatra were arrested late on Monday evening, Korba district police sources said.

The police had earlier arrested Manoj Sharma, a project manager of Gannon Dunkerley & Company Ltd (GDCL), which was engaged in the construction of two industrial chimneys for BALCO’s 1,200-MW power plant. BALCO had entrusted the work of power plant to a Chinese firm SEPCO Power Construction Corp, which had sub-contracted the work of chimney construction of Delhi-based GDCL. Sharma is in judicial custody since his arrest more than a fortnight ago while the arrested BALCO officials are expected to be produced before a court on Tuesday.

After the chimney, which was under construction, collapsed on September 23, the police had registered a case on the charges of culpable homicide not amounting to murder and common intention under sections 304 and 34 of the IPC. The police had asked four Chinese officials to stay back as they were required here for investigations while other Chinese staff were allowed to proceed to their country.