Delhi woman, her 4 kids die after choking on toxic fumes from stove

A 30-year-old woman and her four children died in Delhi on Wednesday after inhaling smoke from an ‘angithi’ (stove) in their room. The incident occurred shortly post-noon on the fifth floor of a house in the Old Seemapuri area at Shahdara in the national capital.

A PTI report, quoting police officers, said a PCR call was received at their office around 1:30pm wherein it was reported that four to five persons were lying unconscious inside a room of the Old Seemapuri building.

After police hurried to the spot, they found a woman and three of her children lying dead, while the fourth and youngest son was alive but in a critical condition. The child was rushed to the hospital but was declared dead on arrival by the doctors.

Police said preliminary inquiry suggested all of them died of suffocation. A stove kept inside the small unventilated room due to the severe cold is likely to have caused a build-up of toxic fumes inside the chamber and suffocate its occupants.

According to a senior police officer, the place where the incident occurred was a rented accommodation inhabited by one Mohit Kalia (35), his wife Radha, and their four children – two daughters and two sons.

The flat belongs to Amarpal Singh, a 60-year-old resident of Shalimar Garden, said deputy commissioner of police (Shahdara) R Sathiyasundaram.