A massive fire accident in Koti today left four textile shops gutted. The total losses to property are yet to be estimated.
The police suspect that the fire, that started in one of the four affected cloth shops, was the result of an electrical short circuit.
Reports say that the fire broke out while a few customers were still present in the shop. There were no causalities however as the shop owner noticed the fire and smoke and immediately evacuated the shop, and alerted the Sultan Bazaar police and the fire department.
Following this, four fire engines were used to douse the fire in a two-hour-long operation, which led to some traffic congestion in nearby areas.
The Sultan Bazaar police have already initiated an investigation into the matter.
Talking about the incident, the affected shop owners said that they had been eking out their livelihoods through their shops for the last 40 years, and that their lives would now be ruined due to the losses caused to them in the accident.
There have been a series of fires caused by electrical short circuits across the city - on January 5, a fire left
a TV repair shop in Kukatpally area's Ramalayam Road gutted. A
hardware shop in a shopping mall, in KPHB Colony, was also seriously damaged in a similar fire on November 15, last year.