Assam Man Killed In Goa Fire Leaves Behind 3 Kids, Family Says Was 'His First Night Shift At Club'

The journey that 32-year-old Rahul Tanti made from his village in Assam’s Cachar district to Goa barely two weeks ago was meant to secure a better future for his newborn son.

On Tuesday, his body returned to the same village, Rangirkhari, accompanied by relatives who worked with him in Goa, a homecoming marked by wails and the weight of a tragedy that has now engulfed three families across Assam.

The night of December 6, when the fire broke out, was his first shift at the nightclub.

According to The Indian Express, Tanti, a member of the tea tribe community, had left school after Class 4 to support his tea garden labourer father.

His brother, Deva, was quoted as saying that Rahul had been determined to educate his three children, including a baby

boy born a little over a month ago, in private schools.

“The wages for working in the tea garden are only about Rs 200 per day, not enough to raise a family the way my brother wanted to,” Deva said, adding that Rahul had decided to take up both a day job as a gardener and a night shift at the Arpora nightclub to save money faster.

“He wanted to give his children an education in private schools so they could study well and do better for themselves than families like ours usually do. He first left to work outside Assam in 2021 and then returned with his earnings and built a home, lived with his family and worked here in the gardens. But after his son was born, he decided that he had to earn more for them,” he said.

Tanti was among three young men from Assam who died when a massive fire tore through the “Birch by Romeo Lane” nightclub in North Goa shortly after midnight on Sunday, killing at least 25 people and injuring six.

News agency PTI reported that all three men, Tanti, 24-year-old Manojit Mal from Silcoore village in Cachar, and 23-year-old Diganta Patir from Dhemaji district, were working as cooks at the establishment.

The bodies of Tanti and Mal arrived at Silchar airport on Tuesday before being taken by road to their respective villages.

Patir’s body was flown to Dibrugarh and then transported by road to Jamukani Matikhola in Dhemaji.

District administrations in Cachar and Dhemaji coordinated with the Goa Police to facilitate the return of the mortal remains, according to officials quoted by PTI.

In all three villages, large crowds gathered as the bodies arrived, and grief-stricken families held their last rites. Mal and Tanti were cremated as per the tea tribe customs, while Patir, belonging to the Mising community, was buried.

Relatives of Tanti and Mal told PTI that they had been compelled to migrate due to the absence of stable employment in the tea gardens of Barak Valley.

Villagers echoed the sentiment, saying that poor wages and limited opportunities had pushed many youths to travel far from home for work.

Patir’s mother told PTI that her sons had sought employment in distant states like Goa and Kerala because livelihood options in flood-hit Dhemaji were scarce.

Authorities are still investigating the cause of the blaze.

While the Goa Police indicated a cylinder blast may have triggered the fire, PTI quoted a survivor who claimed that fireworks set off during a dance performance could have been responsible.

Most victims, officials said, died of suffocation after being trapped on the nightclub’s ground floor.

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