Six employees of private firm killed in Swapnalok fire tragedy in Secunderabad

SECUNDERABAD: As largely feared, the Swapnalok Complex fire tragedy in Secunderabad on Thursday evening accounted for the lives of six persons. The deceased include four women.

All the six, who perished in one of the worst fire accidents in Hyderabad’s history, belonged to a private firm, which had its office on the fifth floor of the building. The deceased were identified as Prameela, Vennela, Sravani, Triveni, Prasanth and Siva. All the six employees of the private firm locked themselves up in a bathroom as fire began engulfing their floor.

The fire-fighting personnel, who battled with the massive fire hard, had to break the bathroom door open to extricate the six persons. All of them were in an unconscious state as they appeared to have been asphyxiated by the thick, toxic smoke.

According to some reports, the fire-fighting personnel tried to perform emergency CPR on some of them there itself. Later, they carried the victims on their shoulders and brought them down to the ground floor using the staircase.

The six persons, in an unconscious state, were rushed to Gandhi Hospital where the doctors, after trying their best to revive them, eventually declared them dead. The tragic news left the families of the victims devastated.

The six persons were the last to be brought out of the Swapnalok Complex at around 10:30 pm. It was not immediately clear if they were already dead by the time they could be extricated from the fifth floor. Earlier, the fire-fighting personnel rescued another seven persons who escaped the fire disaster unhurt. The fire broke out at around 7:45 pm from the lift on the sixth floor and quickly spread across other floors of the building.

Telangana Home Minister Mohammed Mehmood Ali, speaking to the media earlier, called the fire mishap as much bigger than the recent Deccan Mall tragedy. He said that the rescue mission was possible due to the presence of the setback area of the Swapnalok Complex building.