A 40 feet deep and 10 feet wide crater developed on Friday morning in the backyard of a government primary school around 40 km from Dhanbad district headquarters, allegedly due to illegal mining.
There were no injury reports as the school, Naya Prathmik Vidyalaya, is closed because of the statewide lockdown.
Local residents, who rushed to the site, nabbed one person for his alleged involvement in illegal mining and handed him over to the Nirsa Police.
Police barricaded the area and informed the Eastern Coal field Limited management about the incident.
Former Nirsa MLA, Arup Chatterjee, said, “The incident took place due to the illegal mining and had the school been open a major tragedy could have taken place.”