1 dead, 80 rescued as fire breaks out at Sealdah's ESI hospital

NEW DELHI: A fire broke out at the Sealdah (Rajabazar) ESI Hospital in Kolkata early Friday morning, resulting in the death of a patient in the Intensive Care Unit (ICU).

Fire officials confirmed the fire started at around 5am on the hospital's ground floor due to a short circuit.

Fire tenders promptly arrived at the scene and contained the blaze, which spread visibly to the top floor. District Fire Officer TK Dutta described the incident as "a very major fire." He added, "We rescued all the patients who were trapped inside, there were nearly 80 of them. However, one patient who was admitted to the ICU died, but there has been no other casualty."


A patient recalled the moments following the fire, stating, "The room that caught fire, there was a fiber door. I switched off my alarm at 4:40 am... after some time, I saw fire and smoke started entering our room. I started calling for help. Then, the staff came and I was brought down in a wheelchair."

Another patient mentioned hearing sirens and rushing to escape, noting, "We saw the fire at 3 am and we had heard the sirens ringing. We heard people yelling and saw a room on fire when we came out. All our papers are still in the hospital. The AC in the hospital had a short circuit which led to the fire."

Patients were subsequently transferred to other hospitals for treatment. Trinamool Congress leader Kunal Ghosh commented on the rescue efforts, stating, "The fire incident is a very unfortunate one. However, right now there is no time to hold any responsible.

The incident occurred due to a short circuit. 80 to 81 people were rescued however one cancer patient died due to the smoke. 54 patients have been transferred to another hospital."

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