The death toll has risen to 49 in a massive fire at a multi-storey residential building in the Mangaf area of ​​Kuwait’s southern Ahmadi governorate. Another half-hundred were injured in the fire of the building used for housing the workers. India Today reported that 40 of the dead were Indian nationals. However, it is not immediately known whether there are any Bangladeshi citizens among the casualties in the fire in Kuwait.
The country’s government officials said that a fire broke out in the six-storey building in Mangaf area early on Wednesday local time. Major General Aid Rashed Hamad, an official of the country’s security forces, said that local authorities received information about the fire around 6 am.

“The building that caught fire was used for workers,” said a senior police commander in an interview with Kuwait’s state-run television. Many workers were sleeping there at the time of the fire. Dozens of them have been rescued. But unfortunately many died in the fire.”
Qatar’s Deputy Prime Minister Sheikh Fahad Youssef Saud Al Subah visited the site of the fire. The country’s deputy prime minister accused the real estate owners of violating safety laws and greed for the fire. He said, these factors have played a role in this incident. He called the devastating fire in Mangaf a “real disaster”.
According to India Today, at least 40 Indian nationals have been killed in the fire in Kuwait. Five of them are residents of Kerala. There were 195 workers in that building; Most of whom are residents of Kerala and Tamil Nadu.

Onmanorama reported that the building that caught fire belonged to the NBTC Group owned by Malayali businessman KG Abraham.

Meanwhile, Indian External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar in a post on social media X expressed deep grief and condolences over the loss of Indian lives in the fire in Kuwait. In X, he wrote, “I am deeply shocked by the news of the fire in Kuwait. More than 40 people died there. Besides, it is said that more than half a hundred people have been admitted to the hospital. Our ambassador has gone to the camp. We are waiting for details.”

The Indian ambassador to Kuwait said, “More than 30 Indian workers injured in today’s fire have been admitted to the hospital.” Director General of Kuwait’s Criminal Investigation Department, Major General Id Al Waihan, initially confirmed the death toll of 35 people in the fire. Later, among the injured, 14 others died in the hospital, he said.

A source from the country’s General Fire Department said that after the fire broke out on the ground floor of the building, smoke rose upwards. Due to which the workers sleeping there died of suffocation. Kuwait’s Ministry of Health has issued a high-alert alert to all hospitals in Mangaf and its surrounding areas following the incident.

At least 43 people injured in the fire have been treated, the ministry said. Among them, several seriously injured have been shifted to different hospitals.