Overview

• Two family members, 50-year-old Sarmistha Chakraborty and her teenage daughter Dipshikha, were found dead after a fire broke out in their Maligaon apartment at around 4 a.m. Thursday
• Subrata Chakraborty, the husband and father, suffered severe burns and is under treatment at Gauhati Medical College and Hospital
• Police have recovered cigarette butts and mosquito coils from the flat and found no evidence of an electrical fault, shifting the probe toward smoke inhalation as the likely cause
• Forensic experts from the Assam Police CID inspected the scene, collected burn-pattern samples and are awaiting post-mortem and lab reports to confirm the definitive cause
• The Guwahati blaze is the latest in a series of deadly residential fires in India tied to safety lapses, prompting government pledges for tighter inspections and infrastructure upgrades