Diwali dhamaka claims its first victim

TNN / Oct 16, 2006, 01:28 IST

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Diwali crackers claimed their first victim on Sunday with the death of a six-year-old boy in a blaze at Chandanagar.

HYDERABAD: Diwali crackers claimed their first victim on Sunday with the death of a six-year-old boy in a blaze at Chandanagar.
B Sai Nikhil, a resident of BSNL quarters in Chandanagar, succumbed to burns he suffered after crackers triggered a blaze inside a watchman's cabin at a telephone exchange in Chandanagar.
Nikhil's father Srinivasa Rao, a BSNL employee, had left his two children — Sai Kiran and Sai Nikhil — alone at home to attend on his wife Shashikala who was undergoing treatment at a hospital in Balanagar, Chandanagar police inspector M Madhusudhan Reddy said.
Nikhil, along with his brother Sai Kiran and his brother's friend Sharat Chandra, both nine years, bought loose crackers (red bombs) with the money their father gave them before he left for the hospital.

They were bursting crackers near their house all through the day. In the afternoon, the trio went to the watchman's cabin at the telephone exchange, located close to their quarters, and made a pile of the crackers. To make a deafening sound, they put papers and thermocoal sheets on them.
"Sharat Chandra and I came out of the cabin after setting the papers afire. But, Nikhil got stuck there as the crackers started exploding," a visibly-shaken Sai Kiran told TOI.

Fire and smoke engulfed the six-year-old, leaving him dead. Police said smoke might have choked Nikhil and trapped him in the outpost. The flames were so intense that only the metal frame was intact and the wooden planks were all completely burnt.
Watchmen usually occupy the outposts during night. Incidentally, there were two cabins near the telephone exchange.

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