At least seven homes were gutted in a fire at a slum on Kankulia Road, near Golpark, on Friday evening, an official of the fire directorate said.

The fire broke out around 7pm in the slum adjacent to Ballygunge Gardens.

Seven fire tenders doused the blaze in about an hour.

Mayor Firhad Hakim went to Kankulia on hearing about the fire. “The chief minister instructed me to come here. I have spoken with the residents. We will reconstruct the homes. Instead ofbamboo poles, we will useiron to rebuild the homes,” Hakim said.

Sources in the fire directorate said the dry weather during winter makes temporary structures prone to fire.

Sudarshana Mukherjee, the councillor of Ward 68, said most of the residents of gutted homes were hawkers. At least one of them was a taxi driver, she said.

“The exact extent of damage could not be accurately determined as it was already dark. A team from the Kolkata Municipal Corporation will visit the place on Saturday morning to measure the homes and ascertain the extent of damage,” she said. “No one was injured. All the residents managed to come out safely,” she added.