Dhanbad: At least 14 people including ten women and three children were killed after a massive fire broke out at a residential building in Jharkhand's Dhanbad district on Tuesday. Many more people are feared trapped as the apartments housed around 400 people.
The incident happened in the Joda Phatak area of the city. The fire erupted at around 6 pm on the second floor of the 13-storey Ashirwad Tower Apartments, 160 km from state capital Ranchi. "At least 14 persons were charred to death in the incident of fire. Several others are injured. Rescue operation is underway," an official said. Jharkhand Chief Secretary Sukhdev Singh also confirmed that 14 bodies had been recovered so far.
The cause of the fire is yet to be ascertained. The injured have been rushed to the nearby medical facilities, another official added, further noting that the rescue operations were currently underway. Several are "feared trapped", DSP Law and Order, Dhanbad, told news agency ANI. "A few deaths reported. The exact number can't be verified as rescue is still underway," the official added.
District administration, police and fire services are trying to douse the blaze. As many as five fire tenders are at the spot to extinguish the fire. Several people are trapped in the apartment. Sources said that there are about 100 flats in the building and more than 400 people including children and the elderly live in them.
Ashirwad Tower is considered to be the biggest residential building in this area. More than ten ambulances are engaged to take out the people trapped in the apartment and rush them to the hospital. Earlier in the day, two children were charred to death after a fire broke out in their house in Hazaribag district of the same state.
That incident took place at Chechkappi village under Barkatha police station, around 150 km from state capital Ranchi, late on Monday. The siblings were sleeping when the blaze erupted. Hazaribag SP Manoj Ratan Chothe said the house had a thatched roof, which caught fire possibly by a spark from an overhead electrical wire. The incidents come days after another recent blaze in Hazra Hospital of Dhanbad in which five people including two doctors were killed in a fire in a private nursing home in Jharkhand’s Dhanbad on January 28.
