By IANS
Kolkata : Journalists belonging to national and local television channels who were covering the devastating inferno at Kolkata’s Burrabazar were attacked Monday even as the fire continued to rage in a high rise building for the third day.
Police said some people wearing blue badges and wielding rods and sticks attacked media persons, injuring some of them severely, smashing cameras and damaging outdoor broadcast (OB) vans of television channels.
OB vans of 10 television channels, including Times Now, Sahara, Star Ananda, Chabbis Ghanta, NE Bangla and Kolkata TV, were damaged and their cameras broken.
At least 15 journalists, including camerapersons, were injured in the incident. Two of them, who were seriously injured, have been admitted to hospital.
The reason for the attack is not yet known. The Rapid Action Force (RAF) has been deployed in the area to support policemen.
Flames continued to leap out of the 10th, 11th and 12th floors of the 14-storey Nandaram market building in the middle of India’s largest wholesale market Monday even as firemen managed to put out the fire on the ninth floor, a fire official said.
The firemen used carbon dioxide gas to fight the blaze after water and foam failed.
“We hope we will be able to control the blaze in another five hours. Eight gas cylinders in the top floor burst, spreading the fire. There was a huge quantity of inflammables like diesel products,” Gopal Bhattacharya, principal fire officer of the West Bengal Fire Service, told IANS Monday over telephone from the ninth floor of the building.
D. Biswas, director of the West Bengal Fire Service, said: “We hope we will be able to control the fire by the end of the day.”
On Sunday, a deafening explosion, possibly in a generator room, cracked the building in the crammed trading hub, triggering fears of the structure’s collapse.
Around 7.30 p.m. Sunday, explosions were heard as flames leapt out and the fire spread further. Later, more cylinder blasts were heard. The building had already tilted and it was feared that the melting of steel bars due to the tremendous heat generated by the inferno could bring down the structure any moment.
A part of the building has already collapsed. Though fire officials said the rest of the building was not on the verge of collapse, nearby houses were evacuated.
Officials said property worth billions of rupees has been destroyed despite the efforts of 42 fire tenders aided by the army, the air force and the Airports Authority of India (AAI).
A trader of Burrabazar, Tej Narayan Baidya, died Sunday of a heart attack having lost his belongings.
Kolkata fire brigade personnel do not have equipment needed to reach top floors of high-rise buildings.
The narrow crammed lanes of Burrabazar have added to the difficulty.
Traders of Burrabazar said about 2,500 shops, dealing in plastics, polythene and other inflammable materials, were gutted and losses could cross Rs.2 billion.
B.D. Mimani, secretary of the local trade organisation, said “99 percent” of the traders had not insured their shops and would have to rebuild their lives from scratch.
While the buildings burned, the traders and residents wailed as they lost everything in the fire.
It was not clear how the fire began but an electrical short circuit or sabotage are suspected to be possible causes.
Burrabazar is the wholesale market area of Kolkata with clusters of unplanned and unauthorised constructions. The fire spread fast, fanned by a breeze and helped along by inflammables material like plastics, polythene and garments.