India trawls for 'war junk' as missiles, bombs pop up in cities and ports

India on Sunday searched cargo containers for military ordnance after stumbling across huge piles of shells and missiles imported along with scrap metal by private dealers, the army said.
"What we have recovered so far in New Delhi and nearby towns alone can start a little war," a spokesman from the army's bomb disposal unit said at Delhi's Tughlaqabad district which houses a state warehouse for cargo containers.
Some of the projectiles imported with scrap have been found in Delhi's commercial district of Mayapuri, police said, adding that they have also recovered tank turrets and dismantled machineguns originating from countries in Asia, Africa and the Gulf.
The hunt for war junk in imported scrap began after 10 workers died and dozens were injured in a private foundry September 27 after Iranian-made shells blew up during handling in New Delhi's bustling industrial suburb of Sahibabad.
Experts Saturday found 100 shells from metal consignments at Tughlaqabad and said the arsenal comprised mortar rounds, anti-tank shells, anti-aircraft missiles and fragmentation shells.
In a similar hunt Sunday, the experts in the northern city of Jaipur recovered 20 live shells from a private foundry, police superintendent Anand Srivastava said.
He said police Saturday recovered more than 1,000 mortar rounds and bombs from another local factory but only 90 of these were unstable.
"Tonnes of scrap buried probably along with live shells is being dug out and searched," Srivastava added.
"Some of the ordnance is unstable and it's a miracle they did not blow up the ships that ferried them to India," he said as the army destroyed part of the Tughlaqabad cache Sunday.
In the nearby city of Ghaziabad, four shells were found in two of 11 trucks that were searched, an army spokesman said.
Police also found 50 shells in containers in the western port of Kandla during the nation-wide hunt for war junk, officials said Sunday but added the bombs had been disarmed before the shipment.
The alarming recoveries prompted the Indian government to tighten rules Saturday on scrap metal imports, especially from war-affected countries such as Afghanistan and Iran.
"Import of scrap will now be permitted only in shredded or compacted form while other metal waste will be allowed into the country after total inspection at major ports," the Directorate-General of Foreign Trade said in a statement.
Media reports Sunday quoted customs officials as saying that it was almost impossible to rummage through some 1,000 containers that arrive daily at New Delhi's Tughlaqabad warehousing complex after landing at various ports of the country.