A fire broke out at a furniture showroom in Sector 7-C, Madhya Marg, on Friday afternoon, damaging property worth lakhs. No casualties were reported.

The mishap occurred around 2 pm at Gem Furniture, SCO-30. The exact cause of the fire is yet to be ascertained.

Eight fire tenders were pressed into service and it took them around one and half hours to bring everything under control.

“The reason of the fire is not known as yet. But the fire spread fast because of the presence of inflammable substances like thinner,” said SDM M L Sharma, who went to the spot to take stock of the situation.

The showroom was filled with expensive furniture and the workshop — behind the showroom — was also engulfed in the fire.

According to some workers, the showroom caught fire due to the welding work, which was being carried out behind the showroom.

It is also learnt that there was no provision for fire fighting equipment in the store. 

“The whole showroom was filled with wooden items and therefore it was not easy to control the fire,” said one of the over two dozen workers at the store.

According to the owner of the store, Suresh Bhatia, the fire tenders reached the spot late or else the flames could have been controlled with minimum loss to property. “The fire tenders were late by about 15-25 minutes,” said a relative of the owner.

On the other hand, Chief Fire Officer P K Sharma said the Fire department acted promptly after receiving the call informing them about the fire. “We were fast enough to respond to the call and there was no delay from our side,” he said.

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