Fire at Jharkhand school’s hostel, narrow escape for 25 girls

At least 25 girls had a narrow escape when a fire broke out in a hostel room of Kasturba Gandhi Balika Vidyalaya, Bariyatu, a residential school in Jharkhand’s Latehar district on Monday morning, police said.

These students’ beds and study materials were gutted in the fire, first noticed around 6 am, a senior officer said.

A fire tender was pressed into service, and it took more than an hour to douse the blaze, he said.

“Locals and students helped the fire brigade personnel to control the blaze. All 20-25 inmates of the hostel room were out on the ground for physical training when the fire broke out. The initial investigation suggests that a short circuit caused the fire,” Bariyatu police station in-charge Ranjan Kumar Paswan told PTI.

District Education Officer (DEO) Prince Kumar said a probe was underway to unearth the actual cause of the fire.

“We are carrying out thorough verification of electricity connections in the building to ensure that such an incident should not occur in the future,” he said.

Altogether, 221 girls reside in the hostel, the school authorities said.