Two people died in Uttar Pradesh’s Ghaziabad after a fire ignited due to mosquito repellent sticks.
The incident unfolded on Saturday night when the family of four were sleeping in their home in the Prashant Vihar area of Ghaziabad, NDTV reported.
The victims, Arun and Vansh, lit mosquito repellent sticks in their room at 1 am and slept. The father, father, Neeraj, woke up and found a huge smoke and fire coming from his sons’ room at around 2:30 am.
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The father reached to the room where his sons were sleeping, but the two boys had already suffered burn injuries. The father, along with the help of neighbours, tried to extinguish the fire.
By the time, the father managed to douse the fire, Vansh had already died. The other son, who got burn injuries, was rushed to Delhi’s Sufdarjung Hospital. However, the doctors declared him brought dead.
The parents were sleeping in another room when the incident took place. Arun was studying in Class 12, while Vansh was studying in Class 10.
The victims’ father said that there was no electricity in the area when the incident took place as electric wires were being replaced.
“There was no electricity in the area since evening. Due to this lack of air and being troubled by mosquitoes, my children lit the mosquito repellent sticks between two bricks and kept them under the bed they slept on. They were sleeping with a blanket on…there were also some clothes on the bed,” Neeraj told NDTV.
Meanwhile, the neighbours extinguished the fire at the home. The bodies of the victims have been sent for postmortem.
In a separate incident in Madhya Pradesh, a 65-year-old man and his two minor granddaughters were charred to death after their hut caught fire in Shivpuri district.
The incident took place at 11.30 pm on Saturday in Laxmipura village under Bairad police station limits. It is suspected that the house caught fire from an ‘angithi’ (stove) lit for protection from the cold weather, Bairad police station in-charge Vikas Yadav said.
Hajari Banjara (65) and his granddaughter Sandhya (10) died on the spot, while his another grandchild Anushka (5) succumbed to burn injuries on way to hospital.
