By The roof of an illegal coal tunnel caved in at Katras in Dhanbad on September 13, and deaths were reported.
Men and women had entered the tunnel to cut and collect coal when the upper portion collapsed.
The toll was reported as two by one outlet and three by a labour union leader quoted by PTI.
Injured workers were taken to a nearby nursing home.
Police are investigating, and the site is in the Ramkanali police outpost area.
Police reached the site and began investigating the circumstances of the accident.
Reports differed on the toll: a labour union leader quoted by PTI said three people were killed, while AajTak reported the deaths of two women.
Several others were reportedly injured, and three injured workers were said to have been taken to a nearby nursing home.
Locals feared more people could still be trapped under the debris, and rescue efforts were continuing when the first reports were filed.
Illegal coal mining, often done in abandoned or unauthorised tunnels, has long been a safety and law-and-order concern in the Dhanbad coalfield.
Coal from such unauthorised mines is reportedly carried and sold in nearby markets, often on motorcycles.
Collapses in unauthorised tunnels are hard to prevent because the workings are unsupported and unmapped.
The incident has renewed calls from labour groups for stronger enforcement and for alternative livelihoods for people who depend on illegal mining.
Dhanbad is often called India’s coal capital and sits on the Jharia coalfield, one of the country’s most important coking coal reserves.
Legal mining in the region is carried out by Bharat Coking Coal Limited, a Coal India subsidiary, while illegal miners often work in abandoned or unsupervised workings.
The first reports of the accident did not mention any arrests, and police said their investigation into the circumstances had only just begun.
Coal mine in Dhanbad (representative image), Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0
