Eight officers of Titas Gas Transmission and Distribution Company Limited, who have been suspended over the blast at a Narayanganj mosque, were arrested by the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) of police yesterday.

Jisanul Haque, senior assistant superintended of CID, said four of the arrestees were engineers whereas the rest were workers.

At a press conference in Narayanganj, Deputy Inspector General of CID M Mainul Hasan said all the accused were arrested from different areas at Fatullah in Narayanganj Sadar upazila.

"The eight suspended officers and workers of Titas were arrested on the basis of evidence of negligence," he said.

The arrestees are Fatullah Zonal Office Manager Sirajul Islam, 42, Deputy Manager Mahmudur Rahman Rabbi, 34, Assistant Engineer SM Hasan Shahriar, 32, Assistant Engineer Manik Mia, 33, Senior Supervisor Munibur Rahman Chowdhury, 56, Senior Development Worker Ayub Ali, 58, Assistant Hanif Mia, 48, and Ismail Pradhan, 49.

DIG Mainul also said that they would produce the arrestees before court today with a five-day remand plea.

The members of the mosque committee, whose negligence were also found, would also be arrested soon, he added.

On September 4, an explosion at Pashchim Talla Baitus Salat Mosque around 8:45pm and claimed 33 lives so far.

Fire officials said the explosion was caused by the accumulation of leaked gas from an underground Titas Gas pipeline that somehow came in contact with an electric spark.

On September 6, Sub Inspector Humayun Kabir of Fatullah Model Police Station filed a case against unidentified people, alleging negligence resulted in the explosion and casualties.

Titas Gas suspended eight of its officials and staffers in connection with the blast.

TWO MORE DIE

Meanwhile, two persons who suffered severe injuries in the blast died at Sheikh Hasina National Institute of Burn and Plastic Surgery in Dhaka yesterday.

The dead are Abdul Aziz, 40, and Farid, 55.

Of them, Aziz breathed his last around 5:30am with 45 percent burns while Farid passed away around 1:45pm with 50 percent burns, Dr Partha Shankar Paul, resident surgeon of the burn institute, told The Daily Star.

Both of them were undergoing treatment at the Intensive Care Unit of the hospital, he added.

With them, 33 people have so far died from the blast while the condition of four others admitted at the hospital remains critical.