Bangalore's Russell Market, all fired up

Massive fire broke out in Russell Market in the city in the wee hours of Saturday, gutting 123 shops and causing loss of Rs89.2 lakh to the shopowners.

The fire broke out about 3.30am in the 85-year-old building. Initially, eight fire tenders were sent to douse the flames, but the fire department then deployed 21 more. It took them five hours to put out the fire. No casualties were reported in the incident even though 10-20 workers live on the market premises.

BG Chengappa, director of Karnataka Fire and Emergency Services, said the fire department learnt about the incident at 3.45 am. He said that by the first look, it seemed that a short-circuit caused the fire, but the department would investigate further.

Later in the day, the BBMP announced a compensation of Rs50,000 to each shopowner whose shop was gutted in the incident. The total loss of shopowners was pegged at Rs89.2 lakh. The loss to the building was estimated to be Rs31.5 lakh.
The shopowners claimed they saw the fire accident coming.

Salim Ahmed, who owns a shop at Russell Market, said anyone who had seen the wiring at the market could tell that such a disaster was in the offing. He said the market committee kept alerting the BBMP officials about it, but there was no positive response from the civic agency.

Yousuf Taj, a worker at the market, said it was their good fortune that the fire broke out in the wee hours, adding that the scale of the disaster would have been much higher had it happened during daytime, owing to chaos and panic.

Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee president G Parameshwar said the mishap could have been avoided had the BBMP taken steps to maintain the building and rectify faulty wiring. BBMP commissioner MK Shankarlinge Gowda, who visited the spot, said the BBMP would revamp the building from the inside as soon as possible. He said the building’s heritage look would be kept intact.

Mishap or mischief?
Although the preliminary investigation suggested that a short-circuit might have caused the fire, many people at Russell Market believed that local ruffians’ mischief might be behind the accident.
They said that after the market is closed at night, one can see some persons making their way inside it. Bharatinagar corporator Shakeel told DNA that the market was never safe, with ruffians taking shelter inside it during night.

The market’s committee members too said that they had, on several occasions, tried to drive these people out, but they manage to get inside the market by threatening the workers staying there.

DCP (East), Chandrashekar, ruled out foul play, but said a detailed investigation would be done in this regard.