As many as 50 garment shops were completely gutted and a house collapsed after a major fire broke out in old Delhi’s Chandni Chowk on Monday night. The firefighting operations continued for nearly four hours though no human casualties were reported.
29 fire tenders
The fire control room said that at around 9.35 p.m. they were alerted about a fire in Katra Dulia that has over a 1,000 wholesale garments shops. An officer said that around 40-50 wholesale shops in Katra Dulia market were gutted in the fire, leading to a loss of goods worth crores of rupees. According to the fire department, 29 fire tenders were pressed into service and operations continued till well over midnight.
Many shopkeepers saw their entire savings go up in smoke, while others such as Manish Kedar suffered considerable financial losses. Mr. Kedar said the market association has estimated the loss to be anywhere between ₹20 and 30 crore.
Others said that may be an exaggerated figure but even by conservative estimates the figure runs into several crores of rupees.
Narrow lanes
The Fire department has categorised the intensity of the fire as “serious”. A fire official said the challenge was to gain access to the affected area which has narrow lanes. They said the locals also didn’t help matters when some of them squabbled with the firemen over whose shop should be doused first.
There was more drama when local MLA Alka Lamba reached the spot at around 2 a.m. and climbed atop a hydraulic lift. Some of the businessmen, whose shops were lost in the fire, were enraged by this and accused her of “hampering the firefighting operations”.
AAP reacts
The Aam Aadmi Party, meanwhile, said she had gone to address and manage the crowd to prevent an unruly situation. DFS Additional Director Atul Garg also denied that there was any interruption in the exercise by Ms. Lamba.
He added that the skylift had stopped functioning for a brief while due to some electrical failure and it so happened that the switching off took place around the same time that Ms. Lamba had climbed onto the platform.
