Kolkata, March 4 One person died after a fire broke out in a cluster of shops near the Madhyamgram railway station in West Bengal's North 24 Parganas district on Wednesday, officials said.
The body of an employee from a sweetmeat shop was recovered from the damaged shop after fire service personnel managed to extinguish the flames and gain access, they said.
The fire broke out in the sweetmeat shop around 2 pm and quickly spread to adjacent shops, a fire brigade official said.
"A total of eight to nine shops were engulfed in flames, fueled by an explosion of LPG cylinders stored inside. Most of the shops were food outlets," he said.
Three fire engines were able to extinguish the blaze, which partially disrupted vehicular movement on the busy Sodepur-Madhyamgram Road near the station, the official said.
Traffic on the adjacent Madhyamgram flyover was also disrupted for some time following the fire, he said.
However, there was no threat to the railway station premises or train movement, a district official said.