GURUGRAM: A 60-year-old man died and four of his family members sustained burn injuries in a fire that broke out in their room in Sector 45 after the battery of an electric two-wheeler exploded during charging on Thursday night. Though it’s not clear what might may caused the explosion, it resulted in the blankets and the family’s other belongings like clothes and TV set quickly catching the fire.
The fire, in fact, broke out around 11pm when Suresh Sahu, the owner of a tea stall, his wife Reena and their three children, aged 13 to 25 years, were sleeping in their small room in Kanhai village opposite Hotel Ramanda.
Hearing the family’s desperate screams for help and seeing smoke coming out of the room, neighbours rushed to their rescue.
But by the time the neighbours brought the family out by breaking the small room’s window panes, Suresh was already dead. His wife and their three children — Manoj (25), Saroj (18) and Anuj (14) — were rushed to a local hospital in an unconscious condition. Originally from Bihar, Suresh had been living with his family in Gurgaon for the past several years. Manoj and Saroj work as helpers at a shop, while Anuj is a student.
“We initially tried to open the door of their room but it was locked from inside. The room was filled with smoke due to which the family was also not able to open it from inside. We finally broke the window panes to rescue them. It took us and a fire tender nearly an hour to douse the flames,” said a neighbour of Suresh.
Station house officer of Sector 40 police station, inspector Kuldeep Dahiya said that Saroj and Anuj were discharged from the hospital while Reena and Manoj are still under treatment. “The battery of the electric two-wheeler exploded during charging triggering the fire. Surensh’s body has been handed over to the family after an autopsy.”
Dr Deepak Mathur, forensic expert from Civil hospital, said Suresh died of suffocation but he had also suffered 70% burns. “The room got filled with smoke within minutes of the fire as the door and window were closed,” he said.
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Video of Gwalior based Super Eco’s X1 on fire surfaced on social media recently. The company blamed a Bangalore based third party battery vendor for the mishap. SuperEco also supplies the scooter to Sahara Evols, the EV firm of Sahara Group that had made a low key entry in the segment in mid 2019.