14 kitchen staff from Nepal, Jharkhand, Uttarakhand, Assam among Goa fire victims

PANAJI: 14 of the 25 killed in the discharge tragedy at the birch tree by Romeo Lane nightclub at Arpora in Goa were faculty workings in the main kitchen of the nightclub, which was located in the basement with no alternate escape routes, people familiar with the matter said. They belonged to Nepal (4), Jharkhand (3), Uttarakhand (6) and Assam (1). Four were tourists while other bodies are yet to be identified.Their friends and colleagues are now demanding that the government help them not just secure compensation, but also to return the bodies of the deceased to their families.Nandlal, who works as a security guard at an establishment in the neighbouring village of Assagaohails, said three people from his village in Jharkhand’s Fatehpur, who were working in the main kitchen, have died in the incident. “(The victims) Binod Mahato and Pradeep Mahato were brothers. They were working together and had begun work just weeks ago. A third person, Mohit Munda, who hails from a different part of the same village has also been killed.”“We want the government to reach the bodies home and create facilities for it,” Nandlal said.Speaking outside the mortuary of the Goa Medical College and Hospital on Sunday morning, Janak Pujara from Nepal, who is in his early 30s and works at another establishment in Goa, said he had lost one of his countrymen, Bibek Chhetri, in the incident.“This is the fault of the owner. The managers and other top level staff fled from the restaurant at the time of the fire. Why didn’t they notify the staff? They could have been saved. The kitchen was set up in the basement underground. Most of those who perished did so because they had no escape route after fire engulfed the nightclub’s deck. There should have been at least a fire exit for the kitchen. Action needs to be taken against the owner. He too needs to pay compensation and not just the government. The owner is yet to reach out to us. He runs several establishments in Goa and we are employees of his other establishments, but we are yet to hear from him,” he said.“The bodies have been dumped over each other, they are not in the cold room. It will take a while for the families to come here to claim the bodies. We are not from rich families. We have to at least ensure that the bodies are taken care of until the families are here. We can’t afford to take them. The company has all the details of its employees. Till now they have not notified the next of kin about the incident. It is we who have been informing them. Not all have been informed yet,” Pujara said.Meanwhile, Shubham Patil, who hails from Parbhani in Maharashtra, said his life was saved because he was on leave when the incident happened.“I was to join this weekend, but I told them I would join on Monday. I consider myself lucky. Among those who died are workers and kitchen staff who had joined just days earlier,” Patil told HT.North Goa district collector Ankit Yadav said that the government would make all arrangements to ensure that the families get compensation both from the State Disaster Relief Fund, the National Disaster Relief Fund and help to return the bodies to their families.“We are assuring them full support in order to help them reach the bodies home and in order that they get compensation from the SDRF, the NDRF and other bodies. Our team is here along with the police and the health department to help fast track the process,” Yadav said.