VEHARI, May 7: Valuables worth millions of rupees were burnt when three shops and a house caught fire at the local timber market in the early hours of Wednesday.

Timber and valuables at the shops and household goods were reduced to ashes within half an hour. Fire fighters took two hours in extinguishing flames.

Shop owners Muhammad Sharif Bhatti, Muhammad Siddiq and Liaquat Ali Bhatti told this correspondent that the fire had been caused by short-circuit. They held Wapda responsible for the incident.

According to Mepco (Vehari) spokesman, the circles have started shifting electricity meters from outside the houses and shops to polls at the timber market.

The affected people claimed that the authority had used substandard wires while installing dozens of electricity meters on a poll at the market. They added that they had suffered a loss of Rs3 million due to fire.

Later in the day, the Anjuman-i-Tajran held a meeting and demanded the authority that it should immediately stop installing the electricity meters on polls. They also criticized the tehsil municipal authorities for not providing any protection to the timber shops against any accident.

The TMA had installed a water reservoir at the market two years ago to fight such sort of an emergency, but this had yet to start functioning.