About 60 families of farmers and construction workers were left homeless on March 15 after a fire devastated a slum area opposite Mahagun Mezzaria, an under-construction housing complex in Sector 78, Noida. The fire, sparked by a mini cooking-gas cylinder bursting, took just 20 minutes to destroy almost all the huts in the area.
Noida fire service was notified at 9.15 pm yesterday, after which the department deployed seven fire tenders to douse the flames. It took the fire tenders almost two hours to bring the situation under control.
"When I heard the cylinder burst, I immediately came out of my house to see what had happened," said Kuldeep Singh, one of the slum dwellers whose home was destroyed in the fire. "The entire area was ablaze within minutes. The fire tenders reached 25 minutes after the fire broke out. Most of the huts were destroyed by then."
Photo: Samrat Roy
Residents of societies in the area, such as Supertech Capetown, Sunshine Helios and IITL Nimbus The Hyde Park, have started distributing money, food and clothes to the homeless.
Neeraj Virmani, a techie who lives in Prateek Wisteria, a society in Sector 78, said they were running a donation drive in their society to collect clothes for homeless people. "They lost all their belongings last night," said Virmani. "We need to help them out in whatever way we can. We are also accepting donation in cash to buy food for them."
