Noida Raipur Village Shop Fire, Sector 126: One Dead as Cylinders Burst in Five Tea and Snack Shops; Welding Sparks Suspected

What happened

On Saturday, 24 October 2026, around 1.30 pm, a fire broke out in a row of five tea, snack and fast-food shops near the Radha Vallabh temple in Raipur village, Noida. The place falls under the Sector 126 police station area. Reports call it Sector 125 or Sector 126, and say the shops are opposite Amity University. The shops were tin-shed structures. A renovation job, including electrical and welding work, was going on in one of them. The fire then spread to the four shops next to it, and cylinders stored in the shops began to burst. Blasts were heard from a distance, and thick black smoke rose over the area. Updated 26 October 2026.

One employee of a shop was trapped inside and died. He was found after the fire was put out and was declared dead at the hospital. Reports say more than 70 per cent of his body was burnt. We do not name him. Four men who were working at the same shop got out in time.

How the fire spread

Chief Fire Officer Pradeep Kumar Chaubey said the first indication was that sparks from welding work had set off the blaze (Times of India, 25 October; a Hindi report from Noida says the same). Eyewitness Wasim told the Times of India that a short circuit started it, and ETV Bharat quotes the fire officer as saying a short circuit during construction work was the likely cause. These are different accounts, and no official finding has been published. Police and other departments are still examining the circumstances.

The shops were built of tin sheets and stood close together, so the fire moved from one to the next within minutes. Dainik Bhaskar adds that the shops are reported to have been built without permission; that is a single “it is being said” statement and we could not confirm it from a record. What matters for safety is plain: a row of lightweight shops, a live repair job and LPG cylinders inside.

The number of cylinders that burst is not settled. Times of India and Amar Ujala say at least eight cylinders in the shops exploded, and firefighters pulled out about eight damaged cylinders. Dainik Bhaskar speaks of two or three blasts and six or seven half-burnt cylinders removed. IANS says one cylinder reportedly burst, and one early Hindi report says two. We use the range one to eight and mark it as unsettled. Most reports agree that the shops held many LPG cylinders, which is why the fire turned dangerous so fast.

Response

Fire tenders reached about ten minutes after the first call, according to the Times of India. The number of vehicles differs by report: four (the fire officer’s early statement), five (Bhaskar), six (PTI, IANS, Times of India), and ten (one Hindi report). Additional Deputy Commissioner of Police Abhay Kumar Mishra told PTI that 12 fire vehicles had come and six were used. The blaze was brought under control in about one hour (Times of India) or roughly two hours (PTI). After that, firefighters in fire jackets and oxygen sets searched the smoke-filled shops for about an hour, which is when the body was found. They cooled the damaged cylinders with water so that they would not burst again. Police closed the road and kept the crowd back.

The first reports were confused. Some outlets wrote that nobody was hurt, quoting an early statement from the fire department. The death was confirmed only after the search. Eyewitnesses told the Times of India that a few shop workers had minor injuries; police denied any other injury. About 20 people were in and around the five shops when the fire began. The crowd was thinner than usual because most colleges were shut on Saturday. The shops serve students of the nearby colleges and office staff, and all five suffered heavy damage, with goods worth lakhs of rupees destroyed.

After the fire

The family of the dead man is from Himachal Pradesh and lives in Greater Noida West (Times of India). Amar Ujala says he was 25 and that he was cremated on Sunday, 25 October, in Sector 94; it describes him as a resident of Uttarakhand, which does not match the Himachal origin in other reports. On the night of 25 October, his father gave a complaint at the Sector 126 police station. According to Prabhasakshi’s report of 26 October, quoting the station in-charge, the father alleges that the owner of the cafe and the electrical-fitting contractor ignored safety and fire rules while the repair work was going on. Police registered an FIR on his complaint and started an investigation. This is an allegation; we found no report of an arrest or any finding against anyone.

Police have also registered a case over a social media post that linked the fire to communal violence and claimed deaths in firing. Police called the claim false. None of the news reports on the fire mentions any such angle. Read fire news from the official fire and police statements, and be careful with videos forwarded on social media.

Why this matters

Tea stalls, snack corners and tin-shed food courts near colleges and bus stops run on small commercial or domestic LPG cylinders. Many are tightly packed, built with sheets and wood, and do not have a fire extinguisher or a clear exit. When repair, welding or electrical work happens in the middle of such a row, one spark is enough. We have covered the same pattern before: the Khekra shop fire in Baghpat, where two gas cylinders burst in a market, and the Chincholi MIDC fire in Solapur, where welding sparks were part of the account. See also our Mogappair hut fire and Coimbatore LPG shelter fire for how cylinders turn a small fire into a bigger one.

Lessons for readers

• If you run a stall or shop with cylinders: keep only the cylinder in use inside, store spares outside in a ventilated, shaded place, and keep them upright and away from any flame or spark. Fit a hose with a good clamp and check it for cracks.
• Do not allow welding, grinding or electrical fitting while the shop is stocked. Remove the cylinders and stock first, keep an extinguisher ready and take the work only from a trained person. Ask for the cylinders to be shifted out of the whole row, not just your shop.
• Customers and students: if you see smoke or hear a loud pop near a food stall, do not stop to record a video or finish your tea. Move away at once, at least 50 metres, and keep the road clear for fire tenders.
• If cylinders are burning, stay out. A hot cylinder can burst without warning. Call 112 or 101 and give the exact place. Our emergency numbers guide explains which number to call.
• Know the escape route. A shop with a single door and shelves along the walls becomes a trap. Keep the passage clear and tell new workers where the exit is.
• Treat a burn properly. Cool a burn under running tap water for 20 minutes, do not apply toothpaste or butter, and get the person to a hospital. See our first aid guide.

The wider picture is in our notes on festival-season LPG and fire safety and on small electrical faults that cause big fires in homes and shops.

What is still not known

The cause is not established: welding sparks, a short circuit and a cylinder blast are all mentioned. We do not know how many cylinders burst, whether the shops had permission, whether the repair work was authorised, or whether the cafe owner or the contractor will be charged. The fire department’s report is awaited. We will update this page when police or the fire department publish a finding. Last checked 26 October 2026.