Hundreds of shanties were razed to the ground, leaving thousands homeless, in a massive fire at Shialbari side of Jhilpar slum, located in Rupnagar area of Mirpur 6 in Dhaka, on Wednesday.
After the fire broke out at around 9:45am, some 150 fire fighters of 25 fire-fighting units worked for nearly three hours to put out the flames at around 12:30pm.
No casualties were reported as of yet, said Lt Col Zillur Rahman, director (operations) of the Fire Service and Civil Defence.
“The cause of the fire will be known after investigation,” he told reporters at the scene.
The fire department has formed a committee to investigate the cause of fire.
Hundreds of the slum’s low-income residents lost their belongings and shelters.
Locals said many of the residents could not save anything as they were out for work when the fire broke out.
Electricity and gas supply were also cut off in the slum soon after, in an effort to stop the fire from spreading into adjacent buildings.
