Twelve persons were arrested on Thursday in connection with the gruesome tragedy at a fireworks manufacturing unit near Sivakasi that claimed 39 lives, even as the government ordered a magisterial probe into the mishap and officials indulged in a blame-game.
As a hunt was launched to nab the factory owner Murugesan, who fled the scene after the fire, a top police official said several violations of safety norms like overcrowding, overstocking and wrong mixing of chemicals had been found, leading to one of the worst mishaps at the hub of the country's cracker industry.