A fire broke out in an eatery at Sevoke More, a prominent crossing in Siliguri, early on Friday and gutted two neighbouring shops of the locality.
A person sleeping in the eatery died in the blaze.
Sources said around 2am, some local residents spotted flames in the eatery. Soon, it spread into a cell phone shop and a betel-leaf shop next to the eatery.
Residents informed the Siliguri fire station. Four fire tenders took around four hours to douse the flames.
After the fire came under control, the firemen and police, who had also reached the spot, found the body of Parimal Das (35), who used to work at the eatery, inside the gutted remains. It was sent to North Bengal Medical College & Hospital for post-mortem.
The fire, which occurred at the junction of two prominent thoroughfares Hill Cart Road and Sevoke Road, has led to questions on whether fire safety rules are obeyed in commercial places, especially in eateries and restaurants.
Later in the morning, Siliguri mayor Gautam Deb, along with some other representatives of the civic body, visited the spot.
“It was an old eatery that was completely gutted in the fire. I have spoken with the police who assured me that investigation is on,” Deb said.
Since November last year, this is the fourth major incident of fire in Siliguri civic area.
In November, a fire broke out at Ranabusty in ward 18 which left over 300 people homeless. In January, another fire at Dharmanagar in ward 1 in January damaged some hutments.
Earlier this month, a blaze occurred at an apartment in Punjabipara of ward 12.
“But in this incident, a person lost his life. We believe a thorough inspection of all such eateries and restaurants should be conducted to confirm that they follow fire safety norms to avert such incidents,” said a source in the civic body.
Bhaskar Nag, the station officer of Siliguri fire station, said they could control the flame by 4am.
“It is mandatory now to follow the fire safety norms. Awareness drives are being conducted at regular intervals. But it seems a section of people is negligent and that leads to such mishaps,” said Nag.
