A burnt vehicle parked along the manufacturing warehouse-cum-residential building in Hyderabad on Wednesday.
| Photo Credit: Lavpreet Kaur
The sofa manufacturing unit housed on one end of a colony in Venkateswara Nagar of Jiyaguda turned black after an eight-hour-long fire-fighting operation. Burnt two-wheelers, burnt equipment and furniture was seen all around.
A father-daughter duo were killed in the blaze in the four-storied manufacturing warehouse-cum-residential building. “The incident left six others severely injured including Shivapriya’s mother Nagarani, 30, and her five-year-old sister Arani, who are currently undergoing treatment in Osmania General Hospital,” said Kulsumpura Inspector T. Ashok Kumar.
According to area residents, workers, mostly natives of Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal, stayed in the residential portions. Sreenivasa was among the oldest workers in the unit.
Over 20 people trapped on the second and third floors of the building were rescued. Officials from the Clues Team, Forensic Science Laboratory (FSL), Department of Electrical Inspectorate, Industries Department – along with the police – had a close look at the building.
The owner of the property, identified as Dhananjay Bansal, was booked for culpable homicide not amounting to murder under Section 105 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) and further investigation is underway.
Fire Department officials suspect short circuit as the cause of fire. “The fire gained momentum with rexine and wood stored there. We moved the material out of the place to prevent the blaze from spreading further,” said Hyderabad District Fire Officer Ashok. The same material stored in the rear portion of the building led the fire to spread quickly.
The intensity of the heat was felt by those living in an adjacent building separated just by a narrow lane. Haribai’s kitchen on the first floor was destroyed. “The wind blew the flames towards our home,” she cried pointing at the damage.
The fire originated in the manufacturing unit on the ground and first floors and raced to the second and third floors consisting of eight residential portions. The top floor had a tin roof penthouse warehouse where finished products were stored. The unit was involved in manufacturing and storing office furniture including chairs, tables, cabinets and sofas for Tirupati Steel Furniture on Nampally Station Road for the last 40 years.
“We raised concerns with the owner multiple times since the construction of the building about a decade ago, but no action was taken. In fact, the manufacturing unit also used to run in the night causing inconvenience to people in the community,” said one of the neighbours Shivakumar Yadav.
