80-yr-old dies in fire in Sunlight Colony; blaze at CP building
A major fire at a tent house in South Delhi’s Sunlight Colony on Tuesday afternoon killed an 80-year-old man.
Ratan Singh worked as a tailor at the four-storey tent house, said Romil Baaniya, DCP (southeast).
The tent house, named New Variety Decorators Ltd, is located in A Block of Jeewan Nagar in Sunlight Colony.
Initial probe suggested that the fire started on the first floor and rapidly spread to the other floors. Though the cause of the fire remains to be probed, police suspect short-circuit may have triggered it.
There were over 20 employees in the building. They rushed out safely even as the fire department sent out over a dozen fire tenders to control the blaze.
The firefighters managed to gain entry to the first floor, only to find Singh lying dead on the staircase. He was trapped inside, but no one could hear his cries for help.
He was rushed to the AIIMS trauma centre, but was declared brought dead. Police said his death was possibly due to asphyxiation. The fatal blaze follows another fire in the Jeevan Prakash Building near Connaught Place on Tuesday morning that triggered panic among office goers.
Five fire tenders were rushed to the building to control the situation after the fire control room received a call around 11 am.
Atul Garg, chief fire officer, Delhi Fire Services, said the fire started from a pile of garbage dumped on the stairs on the fifth floor of the building located on the Kasturba Gandhi Marg.
The building was immediately evacuated. Firefighters reached the fifth floor using stairs to douse the flames.
However, the flames had not spread beyond the area occupied by the garbage because of which the blaze was controlled within minutes. Garg said the building was soon declared safe to enter.