Delhi fire: Court extends factory owner's police custody

New Delhi: A court here on Monday extended the police custody of the owner of a plastics factory, where a major fire killed 17 persons last week, till January 31.

Metropolitan Magistrate Vikram allowed the Delhi Police to question Manoj Jain for another two days.

On January 24, Metropolitan Magistrate Jitender Pratap Singh had remanded him to five-day police custody.

As magistrate Singh was on leave, Jain was presented before Metropolitan Magistrate Vikram on expiry of his five-day custody.

He was arrested on January 20 night.

The police sought his custody on the ground of through investigation and informed the court that Jain was not cooperating in the probe, as he was not unlocking his phone and pretending illness.

The police said that Jain was the factory owner along with Lalit Goel.

As many as 17 people, including 10 women, were burnt to death or asphyxiated and 30 others injured in the fire in the plastics warehouse in west Delhi's Bawana on January 20 evening.