5 DEAD IN BLAZE...

. Their bodies were found on the fifth floor of the building called MSEZ-03. Later in the day, SII announced an ex-gratia payment of ₹25 lakh each for the families of the deceased.

“We have just received some distressing updates; upon further investigation we have learnt that there has unfortunately been some loss of life at the incident. We are deeply saddened and offer our deepest condolences to the family members of the departed,” SII chief executive Adar Poonawalla tweeted in the evening, a little over an hour after posting that there were no casualties or major injuries.

“I would like to reassure all governments & the public that there would be no loss of #COVISHIELD production due to multiple production buildings that I had kept in reserve to deal with such contingencies at @SerumInstIndia. Thank you very much @PuneCityPolice & Fire Department,” Poonawalla said in another tweet.

His organisation is manufacturing the Covid-19 vaccine by Oxford University and BritishSwedish pharmaceutical firm AstraZeneca in India, where the world’s largest inoculation drive began on January 16 thanks to SII’s Covishield and Bharat Biotech’s indigenously produced Covaxin.

India is also shipping Covishield to its neighbours, strengthening them in the fight against the Covid-19 pandemic. Six countries — Bhutan, the Maldives, Bangladesh, Nepal, Seychelles and Myanmar — are part of India’s initial rollout of vaccines as grant assistance.

On Twitter, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said he was anguished by the loss of lives. “In this sad hour, my thoughts are with the families of those who lost their lives. I pray that those injured recover at the earliest,” he tweeted. Television visuals showed huge plumes of smoke billowing from the building as firefighters worked to extinguish the blaze. “Fire at Serum Institute of India in Pune has been brought under control...I have been informed that the Covid vaccine manufacturing plant is safe,” chief minister Uddhav Thackeray told the media during an interaction at a guest house at Malabar Hill on Mumbai’s suburbs on Thursday evening.

Thackeray will visit the Manjari facility on Friday noon, according to Pune district officials. Deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar said directives “have been issued to the Pune police commissioner for a detailed investigation into the incident”. He said a fire audit will be conducted at the building. “(Also) A team of experts will determine the cause (of the fire),” Pawar added.

Officials said the five-storey building (ground plus five floors) was planned as an extension to the production facility for rotavirus. It is a part of the Manjari facility, which falls in a special economic zone and is around 15km from Pune, which began functioning in September 2019 as an extension to SII’s Hadapsar facility in the city.

The fire broke out on the fourth and fifth floors of the building and the fire department received a call around 3:50pm, according to Pune fire brigade control room officials. It rushed at least 10 fire-tenders to the spot. The fire was brought under control around 5pm and the bodies were found during a rescue operation around 5:30pm. Embers resurfaced at around 7pm during the cooling process, but the situation was quickly brought under control.

“It is the fire experts who will only be able to ascertain the actual cause of the fire,” said Tupe, the local legislator.

BMC is expecting a second lot of 125,000 Covid-19 vaccine doses from SII. Suresh Kakani, Additional Municipal Commissioner of BMC said, “We are on standby, and whenever we get a confirmation from the SII, our vehicles will go to Pune and collect the delivery.” the overall market cap is 49%, while the BSE Midcap and the BSE Smallcap contribute about 13% each.

“The Sensex crossing the important milestone is a telling sign of the economy and markets, shifting orbits on a broadbased recovery and better days ahead,” said Vijay Chandok, managing director and CEO of ICICI Securities. “The combination of strong capital inflows, low interest rates and leaner balance sheets of Indian corporates, along with government measures to support growth, is expected to lift the economy. The same is likely to keep the markets buoyant.”

In the past year, India’s benchmark indexes rose 17% in dollar terms, on par with gains seen in the MSCI World index. However, the MSCI Emerging Markets index, which captures large- and mid-cap representation across 27 markets, has outperformed with a 26% gain.

Analysts are optimistic that the markets will continue to surge ahead despite elevated valuations, except for bouts of volatility around the Union budget.

“The positive thing about the ongoing rally is that it has been fairly broad-based; across market caps and sectors. As the panic and crash was pandemicinduced, the pullback was led by pharma. Since then, banks, information technology, automobiles, etc, have also joined the rally,” said Joseph Thomas, head of research, Emkay Wealth Management.

However, the valuations do look stretched, said Thomas, adding that earnings disappointments remain the key risk at the current juncture. “The continuous upmove, not backed by fundamentals, may make the rally fragile going ahead,” he said.