Madurai: District collector Veera Raghava Rao told reporters that there had not been any loss of life and none had been injured in the fire. He rushed to the temple to lead the rescue operation. Fire tenders had been rushed and more than 50 firemen and officers battled the flames late into night to bring the fire under control.
With the flames raging high and for long, officials feared that the adjacent buildings could catch fire and collapse.
Fire tenders found it difficult to move into the area since the passage was very narrow and crowded.
Many locals pitched in with cans and buckets of water to help douse the fire.
Preliminary investigation showed that electrical short circuit had caused fire in one of the shops and it soon spread to the adjacent shops because of the inflammable merchandise they had stocked.
The main gates had been closed after the darshan hours for the day when the fire was first noticed around 10.20 pm inside the temple precincts housing the rows of shops just outside the outer prakaram.
It took the temple authorities about 20 minutes to rush the keys to the place and open the place for carrying out the fire-fighting.
