Baramulla: Panic gripped staff, patients and visitors after fire broke out in a room at the district hospital (DH) Baramulla on Monday afternoon. Eyewitnesses said that they saw thick smoke coming out of one of the rooms of the main building. They said that fire tenders were called in to douse the flames.
An official of the hospital said that hospital authorities had put fire to the garbage dumped at the rear of the hospital two days ago and it was burning slowly since then. On Monday afternoon, the flames entered one of the rooms of the hospital and some beds and tables caught fire. Timely intervention saved other property, the official said.
Locals said that attendants had to shift their patients outside the building as panic spread at the sight of the smoke.
Medical superintendent (MS) Dr Syeed Masood Ahmad denied that garbage had been set to fire behind the building and claimed that an electric short circuit was the cause. He said there had been no damage caused to the hospital.

Mushtaq Ahamd