In Gujarat, 3 persons were killed in a major fire at storage tank of Indian Oil Corporation, IOC terminal in Hazira, which was contained after a 21-hour operation by fire brigade. Surat District Collector Jay Prakash Shivhare has said that body of one more person was recovered this afternoon. Two persons, whose bodies were recovered earlier in the day, have been identified.

Meanwhile, the Centre has announced an ex- gratia of 5 lakh rupees each to the next of the kin to the three people who lost their lives in fire incident. This was announced by the Minister of Petroleum and Natural Gas, Mr. Veerappa Moily while addressing the media.

Mr Moily today rushed to the incident site to take stock of the situation. The Minister said that the fire incident did not have any adverse effect on the environment but IOC is likely to suffer a loss of approximately 35 crore rupees on the product and 10 crore rupees on account of damage to infrastructure. He also added that appropriate action will be taken in the matter after a thorough investigation. He said that the high-level team constituted by Indian Oil to investigate the cause of the fire is likely to submit its report by 20th of this month.