Mumbai : In one of the worst fire tragedies in recent times, eight people perished in a major blaze that broke out in Hotel City Kinara in Kurla (West) at around 1.30 pm on Friday, which was possibly caused by a gas leak that was ignited by a combustible article. Several people were injured.
The police were trying to ascertain the identity of the deceased amid media reports that five to seven students of Don Bosco Institute of Technology could be among the victims: there was reason for alarm as the students are missing since afternoon and the two wheelers found parked outside the hotel are suspected to be that of the students.
Late night reports said that two of the deceased students have been identified — 19-year-old Bernadette D’Souza, a second year BMM student and Bryan Fernando, a third year IT engineering student; the third deceased person to be identified is a 40-year-old customer at the eatery, Arvind Kanojia.
The other missing students were identified as Erwin D’Souza, Taha Shaikh, Akash Thapar, Sharjeel Shaikh and Sajid Choudhary. The eatery is a stone’s throw from the college. ‘‘They were all my friends and we used to play together in the college ground. All of us used to regularly go to the restaurant and have Chinese food,” said Siddharth. Many of the students were waiting till late in the evening on the college premises for news of their college mates.
Additional Commissioner of Police, Central Region, RD Shinde, told the FPJ reporter that they had been able to successfully retrieve the CCTV footage of a camera in the hotel. “We will be checking the footage to identify the people who were present in the restaurant at the time of the incident,” he said.
It is understood that the fire was caused by a gas cylinder leak that spread from the upper floor of the restaurant to the ground floor. The two storey eatery had four to five tables on the first floor; and on the ground floor there were three tables. The kitchen was on the ground floor and there were two gas cylinders on the upper floor of the restaurant, which were connected to the kitchen. There were gas cylinders on the ground floor as well.
Though there was no blast, the police quoted eye-witnesses as saying that a loud thud was heard. “The false ceiling of the restaurant had collapsed, which resulted in the loud noise,’’ informed Mahesh Patil, Deputy Commissioner of Police, Zone 5.
Local residents are questioning the legality of the structure. Hussain Baksh, a local resident, said, “Why did the hotel have a stock of five cylinders? It is a commercial structure but who gave them the permission to run a restaurant without putting safety precautions in place.” The V.B Nagar Police are in the process of registering an FIR for causing death due to negligence. The bodies have been sent to Rajawadi hospital in Ghatkopar (E).
THEY KEPT SCREAMING
The area, which is chock a block with houses and shops, has two other educational institutes nearby. ‘‘I heard a noise and rushed out. My house faces the window of the restaurant and I saw a boy and a girl trying to get out of the window but they were unable to do so due to the iron grills. Their hands and faces were burnt and I heard them scream for two minutes,” said a lady eye-witness. “Soon they went silent; the screams coming from inside also went silent,” she said.
