Kolkata: 47 hours on, efforts to douse Bagree Market fire still continue
Kolkata, Sep 17 (IBNS): Hundreds of firefighters and as many as 35 fire tenders are still battling to contain the blaze in central Kolkata's Bagree market, nearly two days after the outbreak.
State fire and emergency services officials said that firefighting was underway inside the six-storey commercial building to douse a large number of pocket fire which had been noticed on the second, third and fourth floors of the multi-storey.
"We have arrested source of the fire and our men have reached almost all floors of the multi-storey with all their equipment," the fire services official told IBNS.
"Our operation is still on to douse a large number of pocket fires," the official said.
"We are suspecting that it will take at least two more days to douse the fire completely and to complete cooling off process at the building," he added.
At around 2:30 am. on Sunday, the major fire broke out on the ground floor of the six-storey commercial building, Bagree Market, under Hare Street Police Station limits in central Kolkata's Canning Street area and it spread to other floors quickly as several inflammable objects were stored there.
A fire and emergency services official said that the fire might have started due to a short-circuit in an electricity distribution box beside the building.
"It's a huge fire and firefighting operation became more difficult as several inflammable objects were stored inside the multi-storey market," Fire services DG Jagmohan told IBNS.
"No civilian has been injured so far in the incident while few of our firemen were minorly hurt or fell sick during firefighting operations," the official added.
According to locals, hundreds of shops inside the building have been gutted completely due to the fire.
"Just a month before Durga puja, products and machinery worth several crore rupees have been gutted in the major fire outbreak," a local trader told IBNS.
Another Kolkata building catches fire:
When the firefighting operation was in full swing at Bagree Market, another building in south Kolkata's congested Bhawanipore area caught fire on Monday evening, triggering panic among the locals, reports said.
The fire was first noticed at around 4 pm. inside a sweets production unit of city's reputable sweet brand, Balaram Mullick and Radharaman Mullick, which was located on the top floor of a multi-storey at Bhawanipore's Jadubabur Bazar area.
As many as three fire tenders and city police's Disaster Management Group (DMG) personnel rushed to the scene and firemen fought for nearly half an hour to bring the blaze under control.
Local police said that no casualty was reported in the incident.
Fire department, however, has initiated probe into the reason behind the blaze.
(Reporting by Deepayan Sinha)
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