Meghalaya:In Mawbah locality fire,Siblings, aged 3 & 5, dead

Shillong: Two young children were burnt to death in a devastating fire that engulfed the top floor of a three-storey building in Shillong’s Mawbah area on Tuesday evening.

The narrow lanes leading to the building, located in a congested area, are a major obstacle for fire services trying to put out the fire. The fourth floor, where the fire started, was a wooden house with tin roofs.
Among the two minors who lost their lives were a three-and-a-half-year-old boy and a five-and-a-half-year-old girl. His mother, Mamata Devi, had recently admitted him to Shree Kanchi Kamakoti Vidya Bharati Vidyalaya and was looking forward to sewing his uniform.
The wooden house on the fourth floor was occupied by five tenant families, two of whom had gone out of Shillong on holiday. The other two tenants were at work, while Mamata Devi was fetching water on the ground floor.

A Media representative spoke to eyewitnesses on Wednesday to gain insight into what happened Tuesday evening in Mawbah. Most of the tenants said nothing caught their attention and they were fetching water on the ground floor when the fire broke out.
An eyewitness told East Mojo that Mamata Devi was holding her youngest child, a four-month-old girl, when the fire broke out, and was still in a state of panic over the whereabouts of her other two children. Was unaware. “We only noticed that the fire broke out after it got bigger. If we had known, we could have taken action sooner,” the eyewitness said.
When tenants asked neighbors to make sure all their children were out of the building, Mamata Devi’s two children were tragically trapped on the fourth floor. “It was too late when we realized two children were missing because that was the moment we heard the first cylinder blast. Four cylinders went off yesterday,” said a resident on the third floor of the building. The eyewitness said.
“My husband was devastated when he found out. He was doing everything he could to help evict the tenants, but if he had known about the two children, he would have tried his best to evict them,” she said. ‘ said the eyewitness.
Sania Singh, a young eyewitness, was among those helping the elderly to evacuate the building. He said that the fire is out of control and there is no chance of saving the children. “It took almost two and a half hours to douse the fire because of the narrow street,” Singh said.

In response to the tragedy, Chief Minister Conrad K. Sangma on Wednesday announced that the government would provide the necessary assistance to families whose homes were destroyed in a devastating fire in Mawbah the day before.