A fire, suspected to have been caused by a short-circuit, gutted a furniture showroom and a dairy unit operating at a building at Kashidih in Sakchi, a commercial hub if Jamshedpur, early on Saturday.

It took around two hours for fire tenders belonging to the state fire department and Tata Steel to bring the blaze under control.

The blaze engulfed the dairy unit first and then spread to the furniture showroom.

District fire service officials said they were informed about the fire around 2 am, and the fire tenders reached the spot within 10 minutes. The fire tenders had no problem in reaching the spot of the mishap close to Pearl House.

Timely intervention by fire fighters prevented the fire from spreading to other nearby shops including a car showroom.

The extent of financial losses incurred by the owners if the shops could not be immediately estimated. But, sources in Sakchi market said the losses would be somewhere between Rs 20 lakh and Rs 25 lakh.

Fire station officer Gopal Singh said, "The fire was caused by a suspected short-circuit. A probe has been initiated by Sakchi police."

He said power supply at Kashidih and its adjoining areas in Sakchi was snapped as soon as the fire broke out.
This was the second major fire that broke out at Sakchi in the past five months. On May 1, a similar fire caused by a short-circuit gutted around half-a-dozen shops at Sakchi.