2 killed in Noida apartment fire; e-scooter charging suspected as trigger, illegal building owner arrested

AGo off ripped through and through a four-storey flat in sphere 66 of Noida on wed morning, killing two people, the latest in a spate of infernos in the National Capital Region (NCR) during an unforgiving summer that have underlined the widespread absence of safety systems in residential buildings.A spark from an electric scooter being charged in the parking lot may have triggered the fire, fire department officials and police said after a preliminary investigation.Noida police arrested the building’s lease owner, Krishna Kumar, 40, and booked him under Section 106 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) for causing death by negligence. They also booked Kumar’s accountant Shreejan Das Gupta, and the building’s caretaker, Dharmendra. Police did not respond to requests for comment asking why they were not arrested.Fire department officials said the fire-hit building was illegal. They, however, did not separately confirm whether it had been issued a fire no-objection certificate.The building is 75 metres off the main road and can only be accessed through a narrow lane, which impeded firefighting efforts and prevented fire engines from reaching the building. Two die of asphyxiation, over 100 residents rescuedOfficials said all the vehicles in the parking lot were gutted as the fire and smoke spread rapidly through the upper floors, trapping several residents inside their homes.The dead were identified as Sneha Srivastava, 24, who hailed from Muzaffarpur in Bihar, and Rishabh Kumar, 27, who was from in Madhya Pradesh. Both were residents of the building and worked in private companies.Srivastava lived alone on the third floor and Kumar lived on the fourth floor. “We found the two bodies on the staircase between the second and third floors. There were no external injuries. They died due to asphyxiation,” said Swatantra Kumar Singh, additional deputy commissioner of police (Central Noida).“A scooter charging on the stilt floor of the residential building caught fire, which then spread to nearby parked vehicles. The flames quickly intensified, engulfing the parking area before thick smoke spread to the upper floors,” said Shailendra Kumar Singh, deputy commissioner of police (central Noida).No homes were significantly damaged in the fire. Police said more than 100 residents (50 families) were evacuated.Residents escaped through terraceResidents said the building comprised three blocks — A, B and C — each with a separate staircase. The fire, residents said, cut off the staircase in Block B.“Many of us ran to the terrace and crossed over to Blocks A and C before escaping,” said Nikhil, a resident whose belongings were destroyed.Residents said the narrow lane forced firefighters to stretch long hoses from the nearest accessible point. “Since the exits were blocked, people climbed to the terrace. Someone from the nearby construction site extended a ladder, and many residents escaped through it,” said Ajay Singh Chauhan, who runs a shop in the locality.Brajesh Shankar, Sneha’s cousin, told HT that she had moved into the building only 2-3 months back after she got a new job. “On Tuesday, she even invited me to come meet her but I could not visit her.”Latest in series of NCR fire tragediesWednesday’s blaze comes weeks after a clutch of major fires in Delhi. On June 3, a fire at an illegally run bed-and-breakfast in Malviya Nagar’s Hauz Rani killed 22, most of them foreign nationals in the city for medical treatment.On May 3, a blaze in a four-storey residential building in Vivek Vihar killed nine people, including a one-year-old, after a suspected AC blast.“The fire-hit building was an illegal structure. Our fire tenders reached the spot within eight minutes of receiving the information. However, because the lanes were too narrow, the vehicles could not reach the building directly, and firefighters had to lay hoses from the nearest accessible point to carry out firefighting and rescue operations,” said Pradeep Chaubey, chief fire officer, Gautam Budh Nagar.The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Noida MLA, Pankaj Singh, described the incident as tragic and demanded a fair investigation.