Tarapith fire: Hotel owner, son arrested as death toll rises to 9

Two people, including hotel owner Kalyan Pal, have been detained in connection with the blaze, as police probe whether there were lapses in fire-safety arrangements at the establishment

Two persons, including the owner of Hotel Bideshini and his son, were arrested after an early morning blaze in the hotel at Tarapith, a temple town in West Bengal’s Birbhum district, killed nine persons on Monday.

The fire erupted around 4am on the ground floor of the four-storey hotel in Tarapith. (ANI photo)

“We have arrested two persons. Prabir Kumar Pal, the hotel owner and his son Kalyan Pal, who worked as the caretaker. While Kalyan was arrested late on Monday night. Prabir was arrested in the early hours of Tuesday. Police have registered a suo moto case. The fire brigade has also lodged a complaint,” said a senior police officer of Birbhum.

In all, nine people, including two children, were killed in the fire. While five of the dead were residents of West Garo Hills in Meghalaya, four were from Alipurduar and Jalpaiguri districts in West Bengal. At least 34 hoteliers survived.

Meanwhile, search operations were launched in a pond located just behind the hotel to check whether any hotelier, who tried to escape the blaze, fell in the pond.

“The hotel’s register was possibly destroyed in the fire as the blaze started near the reception area. So, we don’t know how many guests were there at that time. We have identified 43 people, of which nine were killed. Some hoteliers managed to escape using pipes and trees. In the morning we deployed a boat to search the pond to check whether anyone drowned as the pond was right beside the hotel,” said another police officer.

According to officials, the fire broke out around 4am at the reception area on the ground floor of the four-storey hotel, when most of the guests were asleep. The blaze spread rapidly through decorative and wooden materials inside the hotel, with smoke billowing to the upper floors and trapping several guests in their rooms, they added.

Several guests at the hotel were devotees who had come to offer prayers at the Tarapith Temple.

Preliminary investigations revealed that the hotel’s front door access was cut due to the fire in the reception area. Emergency exits on each floor were locked and the terrace door was also blocked with plywood, trapping the smoke, a police official said.