14 killed as massive blaze turns Kolkata hotel into gas chamber

KOLKATA: A six-storey hotel nestled within central Kolkata's congested Mechhua wholesale fruit market caught fire on Tuesday evening, quickly turning into a gas chamber that killed 14 people trapped inside, 13 of them guests.

All the victims, barring a staffer who jumped to his death in a bid to escape the smoke and another who suffered fatal burns, died of asphyxiation, officials said. Three of the deceased were from a Chennai family that had returned the previous night from a holiday in Darjeeling and Sikkim.

Malfunctioning smoke detectors and sprinklers in the 42-room Rituraj Hotel with 88 guests accentuated how unsafe the building was, police said. The hotel had been allegedly functioning over the past three years without the stipulated NOC from fire services department.

Windows sealed, people outside were unaware of fire

The fire is suspected to have started in the banquet area on the first floor that was being converted into a dance bar. The state govt set up a special investigation team to probe the blaze after unapproved structural changes were detected within the building, whose owners are absconding.

Fire brigade officials said they received the first call from the hotel at 8.10pm Tuesday, shortly after staffer Manoj Kumar Paswan leapt off a ledge and became the first victim. It was only after seeing him jump that locals realised the hotel was on fire.

“Since all the windows on the first floor and that of several rooms in the floors above were sealed, nobody outside realised the hotel had caught fire till around 30 minutes later. Inside the hotel, too, guests and hotel staff did not get wind of the blaze till smoke filled the stairwell, corridors, and started seeping into the rooms,” a fireman said.

Fire brigade personnel were able to enter the hotel only five hours later. They found 12 people dead in the rooms and the corridor. Another victim collapsed and died after reaching the terrace. Post-mortem reports suggested they died of carbon monoxide poisoning.

CM Mamata Banerjee , who was in the sea resort of Digha, took stock of search and rescue efforts with Kolkata mayor Firhad Hakim and police commissioner Manoj Verma. “Investigation has been ordered. My condolences to the victim families and solidarity for all affected,” she wrote on X.

PM Narendra Modi condoled the deaths and announced ex gratia of Rs 2 lakh to the next of kin of each of the victims and Rs 50,000 for each of those injured.

Hakim said Wednesday that illegal portions of the hotel would be demolished.