Telangana: Fire breaks out at Devan Devdi market in Hyderabad’s old city

The fire broke out on the fourth floor of Madina and Abbas Towers Building located at Devan Devdi and soon spread to adjacent shops

Hyderabad: Property worth crores was gutted when a fire broke out in a commercial building at Devan Devdi in the old city in the early hours of Monday. No casualties were reported in the incident as fire fighters managed to rescue a family staying in the top floor of the two-storied building.

The fire control room received a call at around 2.10 am about a fire in the Madina and Abbas Towers Wholesale Market having close to 400 shops. A vehicle from Moghalpura fire station rushed to the spot and noticing the intensity of the fire more fire tenders were sought for assistance. Fire tenders from Salarjung Museum, Chandrayangutta, High Court, Gowliguda and other fire stations were rushed to the spot.

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“The fire started in a shop on the second floor and spread rapidly to the upper floor. We climbed on the adjacent buildings and prevented the fire from spreading to the other buildings. In fact, we prevented the fire from spreading to the first floor and confined it to the eastern side of the building,” said T Venkanna, District Fire Officer Hyderabad.

The fire tenders went to replenish the water from nearby water sources and returned to fight the blaze every couple of hours. Around 50 fire fighters continued to battle the blaze until around 4 pm on Monday, the fire was completely brought under control.

At least ten shops running from around 25 mulgis were completely gutted down in the fire incident. “We have not assessed the damage and the cause of the fire is being ascertained. We suspect the fire started due to a short circuit,” said the official.

The commercial complex is located adjacent to the Shia religious place the Bargah Abul Fazlil Abbas and the fire fighters had to work hard to prevent fire from spreading towards the religious place.

The building has only commercial shops and thousands of people visit the market every day. However, there are no proper staircases and people are forced to use iron stair cases to reach the upper floors. As mandated there are no staircases outside the building to allow people to rush out in case of fire incident.

The Disaster Response Force personnel visited and inspected the building. A call on allowing business activity to resume in the building will be taken on Tuesday after a detailed inspection.