press trust of india
Kollam, April 10: In one of the worst tragedies to hit Kerala, at least 106 people were killed and 383 injured in a devastating fire that engulfed the 100-year-old Puttingal Devi temple complex near here during an unauthorised display of fireworks Sunday.
A late night statement issued by the CMO said 106 people had lost their lives in the incident that left 383 others with injuries. A judicial probe by a retired High Court judge was ordered by the state government along with an investigation by Crime Branch into the tragedy, Chief Minister Oommen Chandy announced after an emergency Cabinet meeting over the tragedy.
At least 75 bodies have been identified and 84 post-mortems conducted and the bodies handed over to relatives, he said.
Chandy also announced ex-gratia relief of Rs 10 lakh to kin of each of those killed in fire, `2 lakh for seriously injured and Rs 50,000 for those with minor injuries.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who termed the incident as ‘‘heart-rending’’ and ‘‘shocking’’, announced Rs 2 lakh each as compensation for the next of the kin of the dead and Rs 50,000 each for the injured. He later rushed here to personally take stock of the situation and see the injured.
The tragedy struck at 3.30am during display of fireworks at the temple complex, which is 70 km from capital Thiruvananthapuram.
The display, for which no permission had been granted by Revenue and police officials, had started at midnight as part of an annual festival and thousands of people had gathered to witness it.
The mishap occurred as sparks of the fireworks fell on the store room ‘Kambapura’ and the fire crackers kept there exploded with a deafening noise, police said.
The sound of the explosion could be heard over a radius of one kilometre and the whole area plunged into darkness as the power supply went off and people ran helter-skelter, eyewitnesses said. Charred bodies and human remains were strewn around the temple complex after the fire tragedy.
The Chief Minister said the district collector of Kollam had not given permission to conduct the fireworks. Collector A Shainamol said ‘‘no permission for any kind of fireworks’’ was given.
She said the temple authorities had asked for permission to conduct competitive fireworks which was denied. For normal fireworks, no permission was sought and hence there was no question of granting it, she added.
Police sources said a case has been registered against temple authorities and explosive licensees under section 307 (attempt to murder), and 308 (attempt to commit culpable homicide) of IPC and under section 4 of Explosives Substances Act. The Centre rushed the chief controller of explosives safety organisation PESO to check if there was illegal usage of crackers or explosives at the temple in Kollam. Meanwhile, the 15-member temple committee, which was on the precincts, when the mishap occurred, went missing soon after the incident, local people said.
