Pune: The families of 14 workers who burned to death in a candle-making unit fire in Pimpri-Chinchwad will finally receive compensation, after the National Green Tribunal ordered the Pune District Collector to release nearly ₹2.70 crore to them from state funds.
The Western Zone Bench of the NGT has directed that the money be paid out within two months of the order being uploaded. The state will not bear the final cost, though, the tribunal has made clear that the amount is to be recovered afterward from the company at the centre of the tragedy, M/S Shivraj Enterprises.
The order came from a two-member bench of Justice Dinesh Kumar Singh and Expert Member Sujit Kumar Bajpayee, who heard the matter on July 27 and uploaded their ruling two days later, on July 29.
The tribunal did not wait for a petition to land on its desk. It took up the matter suo motu, after a news report published on December 9, 2023 headlined "Pune: 6 dead in fire at candle making unit" brought the incident to its attention. The eventual death toll from the blaze rose to 14, most of them women, and the fire left lasting questions about how safe the state's small industrial units really are for the people working inside them.
Lawyers for Shivraj Enterprises argued during the hearing that the fire had wiped out the company financially, leaving it in no position to pay compensation. That claim was repeated in a sworn affidavit, with the company citing its lack of financial capacity.
The tribunal was not moved by the argument. Acting on its earlier order dated July 17, 2026, it had already asked the company to submit a compensation statement and that statement had to follow the formula set out by the Supreme Court in the Sarla Verma judgment, which weighs a victim's age, income and how many people depended on them.
An affidavit from the Pune Collector's office showed that each family had already received Rs.7 lakh in immediate relief Rs.5 lakh from the state government and ₹2 lakh from the Prime Minister's Relief Fund.
Compensation amounts vary case by case, depending on each victim's circumstances, ranging from roughly ₹1.63 lakh to over ₹28 lakh. The heirs of Apeksha Ashok Torane, Pratiksha Ashok Torane and Radha Sayaj Godhade are set to receive the highest individual payouts, while the legal heir of Kamaladevi Suraj Prajapat will get ₹1.63 lakh.
For families who lost loved ones in a fire that exposed just how fragile safety standards can be inside small factories, the order finally puts a figure and a deadline to a wait that has stretched on for over two and a half years.