Kolkata, August 20: The Kolkata police have identified the nine victims who lost their lives in a hotel fire on Mirza Ghalib Lane in central Kolkata on Thursday. Among the deceased, seven are Bangladeshi nationals, while two are Indian citizens—one from Giridih district in Jharkhand and the other from Darjeeling district in North Bengal.
The police disclosed the passport numbers of the seven Bangladeshi victims, which included six men, two women, and one child. All seven were from the same family, identified as Debashish Dutta (39), his wife Afsana Shirmiyan (27), their young son Swarnashish Dutta, and Afsana’s father Mohammad Akram Ali (74). They had come to Kolkata for medical examinations. The family hailed from the Kushtia district of Bangladesh, and Debashish was a journalist by profession.
The fifth Bangladeshi victim was identified as Babu Ahmed (37), originally from Dhaka, while the other two were identified as Reboti Sarkar and M. Alimuzzaman, both from Kaliganj in Bangladesh. The Kolkata police have not disclosed their ages.
In addition to the seven Bangladeshi nationals, 19-year-old Sandeep Paswan, who worked at the hotel, was also confirmed dead. He was originally from Giridih district. The ninth victim was identified as Yog Narayan Agarwal (68), a resident of Darjeeling, West Bengal.
Notably, all victims succumbed to asphyxiation, with no visible injuries reported. Preliminary investigations revealed that the fire on the third floor was not intense, but the lack of timely rescue efforts led to the tragic loss of life as the entire building filled with smoke.
In response to this incident, the West Bengal government has ordered an audit of all hotels, lodges, and guesthouses in the state. The building where the fire occurred falls under the jurisdiction of the New Market police station, which has taken cognizance of the incident. The State Fire Service Department has also registered a separate case regarding the incident.
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