The Kuwait Building Fire Took Lives of Mostly Indians; Out of 49, 42 Were Indians

On early Wednesday, ruffles of black smoke emerged out from a building of foreign housing workers in the city of Mangaf in Southern Kuwait. Now in the latest update, it comes out of 49 people who were killed, 42 were Indian nationals. Those who dies were between the age range of 20-50 years.

The local authorities have nabbed the building’s owner for potential negligence of fire security of the building.
When the fire broke out on Wednesday, the authorities of Mangaf were reported of the incident at around 4:30 am. Till they reached, mostly people died of choke.
According, to Kuwait’s interior ministry’s statement, along with majority Indians, the rest dead were from Egypt, Nepal, Pakistan and the Philippines.

According to Hindustan Times report, an Indian engineering and construction firm, NBTC group. Partially owned by an Indian had rented the building for most of the Indians or workers coming from the South Asia region. It accommodated more than 195 people.

On this tragic incident Prime Minister Narendra Modi expressed his grief and announced compensation of 2 Lakhs to the family of deceased Indians from PM’s Relief Fund and also assured of any kind of assistance from the government.

MEA Official Spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said, “As directed by PM Modi, MoS for External Affairs Kirti Vardhan Singh will be visiting Kuwait to oversee assistance to those injured in the fire tragedy and to coordinate with local authorities,”.

So, the 5 injured Adan, Jaber, Farwaniya, Mubarak Al Kabeer and Jahra are now being provided with medical care and assistance in 5 government hospitals.

On the directions of PM Modi, Minister of state for external affairs Kirti Vardhan is expected to reach Kuwait by Thursday, and closely watch the situation.

Talking to ANI, Jalaludeen, father of Najeeb who is also in Kuwait and is a friend of deceased Shameer, says, “Najeeb has been in Kuwait for four years. This morning at 11, he called and informed me that a building caught fire in Kuwait and Shameer had died. My son Najeeb jumped from the second floor to escape and broke his leg. He informed me that he couldn’t come home immediately as he needed to complete his treatment and other formalities. I learned from the news that 11 people have died. We didn’t get any information from anyone in Kuwait. I just found out that it was a company run by Malayalees. Najeeb’s treatment is ongoing in coordination with the embassy.”