The destroyed top floor of the Tiljala factory. Picture by Amit Datta

Soumen Ghosh was enjoying the Kali puja evening with friends at a neighbourhood pandal when a friend rushed in with the news that the rubber factory next to his house had caught fire.

When the 24-year-old rushed to his terrace around 8.30pm, he could not believe his eyes. The top floor of the three-storeyed factory in Tiljala, which was allegedly being run illegally, was up in flames.

“The huge stock of finished goods and raw material was burning and the flames were fast spreading towards our house,” Soumen recalled.

The youth had every reason to fear for his life and that of his family members as parts of the factory were just 2 ft from his house.

He asked his uncle and aunt whom he shares the house with to evacuate before rushing to the factory to help the fire-fighters.

Soumen was not the only resident of Kustia Road who panicked at the sight of the fire. About 45 people live in five buildings that either share the boundary wall with the gutted Banik Rubber Industries Private Limited or are within 2-5 ft of it.

“Earlier, there was a fan factory on the spot. One day we heard the plot had been sold and a huge rubber factory would come up on it. We were scared as rubber factories deal with inflammable material and ran from pillar to post, in vain, to stall the construction,” said Binapani Hazra, who had to vacate her house and spend the night with her three children in the open.

“The flames were leaping higher with every blast in the factory. Since the firemen were spraying water from the front, the blaze was moving backward towards our houses,” said Soumitra Ghosh, who lives in a two-storeyed building just behind the factory.

Twenty-three tenders fought the blaze for five hours before the adjacent buildings could be declared out of danger.

Fire officials said thousands of litres of chemicals — comprising thinner, lacquer and glue — were stored in the factory along with rubber sheets, cartons, diesel and mobile. “All the items were inflammable,” said an official.

The fire-fighters were constantly spraying water on the containers storing the chemicals so that they did not explode in the heat. “The stock was enough to blow up the factory and the neighbouring buildings,” said Gopal Bhattacharjee, the director-general of fire and emergency services.

A complaint has been lodged with Tiljala police station against Banik Rubber Industries. “The factory owner did not abide by any fire norms,” said Bhattacharjee. A forensic probe has been ordered to find out the cause of the fire.

The fire in the rubber factory was the third major blaze in the city in the past week — the earlier two were in a Tangra tannery and a shoe-manufacturing unit in the Amherst Street police station area. All three units were being run in violation of fire norms.

“The rubber factory was being run illegally,” said local Trinamul Congress MLA Javed Ahmed Khan.

Residents of the Topsia-Tangra-Tiljala belt alleged that the area has become a hub of illegal factories and sweatshops. According to a rough estimate, more than 5,000 big and small units are operating in the area illegally.