Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal condoled the death of newborn babies in the fire at a children’s hospital in the national capital and said the guilty won’t be spared.
Reacting to the incident, Kejriwal tweeted, “Incident of fire in a children's hospital is heartbreaking. We all stand with those who lost their innocent children in this accident. Government and administration officials are busy providing treatment to the injured at the spot.” The Delhi chief minister added probe is progressing and those involved will be punished. “The causes of the incident are being investigated and whoever is responsible for this negligence will not be spared,” he added.
According to police, the owner of the hospital, Naveen Kichi, is at large case has been registered against him under sections 336 and 304A. At least seven newborns died after a massive fire broke out at a children's hospital in the Vivek Vihar area in East Delhi on Saturday night. Though rescuers managed to evacuate 12 children, six died while undergoing treatment. One is on the ventilator and five others are admitted to East Delhi Advance NICU Hospital. Besides the hospital building, two floors of a residential building on the right side also caught fire. The fire was extinguished by Sunday morning.
President Droupadi Murmual also condoled the death of the children and said, “The news of the death of many children due to a fire in a hospital in Vivek Vihar, Delhi is heart-rending. May God give strength to the bereaved parents and relatives to bear this shock. I pray for the speedy recovery of other children injured in this incident.”
A senior police officer told PTI that a fire broke out at the Baby Care New Born Hospital and its adjacent building at around 11:30pm on Saturday. “The babies were rescued from the hospital with the help of other people and shifted to another hospital. While six babies were declared brought dead, one died during treatment,” the officer said. The bodies have been shifted to the GTB Hospital for post-mortem, police said.
Delhi Fire Department Director Atul Garg said the fire spread due to blast in the oxygen cylinder.
Delhi Health Minister Saurabh Bharadwaj said all the newborns died due to suffocation. "I tried calling the health secretary but he is not picking up. We will take such strict action that none of the officials commit such negligence in future. We are with the families who have lost their babies. I'll talk to the DCP regarding this," he said.
