Days after Rajkot fire, game zone co-owner held; arrests in case rise to 10

Police have arrested a co-owner of the Rajkot game zone, where a fire claimed 27 lives last month, taking the number of arrests in the case to ten, an official said on Friday.

Ashoksinh Jadeja, one of the six owners of the TRP game zone, surrendered before the police on Thursday evening, the official said.

Jadeja, who owns the land on which the game zone had come up, had been absconding after a fire devastated the recreation facility on May 25 in Gujarat's Rajkot city.

Rajkot Police Commissioner Brajesh Kumar Jha confirmed on Friday that Jadeja is in the custody of the crime branch after his surrender.

Earlier, police had arrested five co-owners and a manager of the game zone. They also took into custody four government officials, including Rajkot's Town Planning Officer (TPO) M D Sagathia, assistant TPOs Mukesh Makwana and Gautam Joshi, and former station officer of Kalavad Road fire station Rohit Vigora.

During the probe, it was confirmed that one of the co-owners, Prakash Hiran who was named in the FIR and missing since the tragedy, had died in the deadly fire as he was inside the facility when it was gutted.

CCTV camera footage showed the fire started after sparks fell on thermocol (polystrene) sheets during welding work on the ground floor. Though workers present there tried to douse the fire with fire extinguishers, it spread quickly and eventually engulfed the game zone.

According to the police, the game zone was being operated without any no objection certificate (NOC) from the fire department of the Rajkot Municipal Corporation.

Several game zones and other recreation hubs were sealed across the state after the Rajkot incident and FIRs were also filed against the owners for running such facilities without any permissions.