A fire gutted the puja pandal of FD Block in Salt Lake, one of the most popular Durga Puja pandals in the township, on Wednesday morning.

No one was injured in the fire, an officer of the Bidhannagar commissionerate said.

Morning walkers in the FD Block park were the first to spot flames leaping out of the main pandal around 6:15am and they alerted the fire brigade, a fire officer said.

Two fire engines from the Sector V fire station doused the flames in close to 45 minutes but by that time the pandal and the idols were gutted.

FD Block residents complete puja rituals in front of the community centre on Wednesday. Sanat Kr Sinha

Fire and emergency services minister Sujit Bose reached the spot. A forensics team visited the pandal and collected samples from the site.

“We have launched an investigation to ascertain what triggered the fire. Fortunately, the guards and dhakis were not inside the pandal when the fire broke out,” Bose said.

Preliminary investigations have revealed a short circuit in one of the electrical lines had started the fire, a fire officer said.

“It took us close to 45 minutes to douse the flames. The fire spread rapidly as the pandal had been built using bamboo shafts, paper, plastic, and cloth,” the officer said.

The fire rages on at FD Block pandal Sanat Kr Sinha

The FD Block Puja committee had planned to immerse the idols on Wednesday evening.

The pandal had The Jungle Book as the theme with Mowgli, Baloo, Bagheera, Sher Khan and others celebrating Puja together in a fantasy jungle.

The debris of the pandal Sanat Kr Sinha

As the fire spread rapidly through the pandal several members of the puja committee as well as residents tried to douse the flames by splashing buckets of water.

Residents of FD Block who live near the park said they had heard small explosions as each animal model went up in flames one after the other.

The debris of the pandal Sanat Kr Sinha

“The fire is heartbreaking for us. We are completely devastated,” Rajorshi Dey, a resident of FD Block, said.

Banibrata Banerjee, one of the members of the puja committee, said they had dipped all pandal materials in a fire-retardant solution and had fire extinguishers in the pandal.

“We are not ruling out arson. Our pandal drew a huge crowd,” Banerjee said.

The debris of the pandal Sanat Kr Sinha

Ashim Das, one of the artisans who had supplied the models of Mowgli and the other animals, said he was supposed to take them back to Kumartuli and spruce them up for installation on various boulevards in the township.

“The plan was to install all the animals in parks and on dividers. Sadly, we will not be able to do that,” Das said.

The residents of the block completed the rituals of Durga Puja on a raised platform outside the FD Block community centre on Wednesday afternoon. “The rituals had to be completed and we did so,” a member said.

Lakshmi Puja and Kali Puja will be held as planned on the ground floor of the FD Block community centre, the member said.