In an unfortunate incident, four members of a family, including an eight-year-old boy, died in a fire that broke out on the wee hours of Tuesday. The incident took place in the house of a businessman in Dilshad Garden area of North East district. “The deceased were identified as Pradeep Jaiswal (59), his son Rajan (34), daughter-in-law Anuja (33) and grandson Anshul (8),” said a police officer. There were six people in the house when the fire broke out around 5.45 am. All six were rushed to nearby GTB Hospital, where doctors declared four dead on arrival.
Pradeep’s wife Saroj and daughter Selja survived the blaze and are undergoing treatment at a hospital, police said. The fire was suspected to have originated from a short circuit in the family’s dry-cleaning shop in the front of their residence. It was Selja who noticed the fire first, while others were sleeping, and raised an alarm, said the officer. Some neighbours claimed that petrol kept in their shop caught fire through short circuit and later engulfed the entire house.
Eight fire tenders were rushed to the spot and took more than an hour to douse the flames, following which a cooling operation was launched. However, it is alleged that fire station is only a kilometre away from the place of incident, even then the fire tender arrived two hours later the incident.
A police officer said that Rajan, in his bid to save his family, locked his wife and eight-year-old son in the bathroom, but they soon died of suffocation. After preliminary investigation, it emerged that Anuja and Anshul died of asphyxia and later their bodies caught fire, the officer said. Pradeep and Rajan got trapped inside the house and were charred to death, the officer added.
Police have registered an unnamed FIR in connection with the incident. “We have registered a case under IPC Sections 304A (causing death by negligence) and 336 (act endangering life or personal safety of others). Forensic teams and a district police crime team were engaged in inspection of the spot. Probe is underway,” DCP (North-East) AK Singla said.