AT least 21 pupils and two wardens died after a pre-dawn fire broke out at the Pusat Tahfiz Darul Quran Ittifaqiyah religious school in Jalan Datuk Keramat, Kuala Lumpur, today.

“The number of confirmed dead are 21 pupils and two wardens,” Khirudin Drahman, director of Kuala Lumpur’s fire and rescue department told AFP.

Many of the victims are believed to be between the ages of 13 and 17, according to information from the department.

Six people were rescued, of whom three are in critical condition and now warded in Kuala Lumpur Hospital.

The fire was believed to have started out at one of the bedrooms at the top floor of the three-storey school.

Fire and rescue officials who arrived at the scene at 5.52am described the fire as “raging”. Officials managed to control the fire within 25 minutes.

Officers then discovered 15 bodies on the top floor. Police said they have yet to confirm the number of victims and are continuing investigations into the cause of the fire.

“It really does not make sense for so many to die in the fire,” Khirudin told AFP.

“I think it is one of the country’s worst fire disasters in the past 20 years.”

He said the pupils and wardens could have died due to smoke inhalation or got trapped in the fire.

“We are now investigating the cause of the fire,” he said.

The department later updated the total figure of those dead to 23, with the latest casualty said to be a teacher.

Loga Bala Mohan, the deputy federal territories minister, said: “We sympathise with the families. It is one of the worst fires involving so many lives in the capital in recent years.

“We want the authorities to quickly probe the cause of the deadly fire so that we will be able to prevent future disasters.”

A fire department official at the scene said that the blaze broke out in bedrooms before dawn, and firefighters from a nearby station were on the scene within minutes.

Local media reported that the fire and rescue department had raised concerns about fire safety measures at unregistered and private religious schools and had recorded 211 fires at the institutions since 2015.

In August, 16 people including eight pupil fled an early morning fire at a family-run tahfiz in Baling, in the northern state of Kedah, the Star reported.

There are 519 tahfiz schools registered across the country as of April, but many more are believed to be unregistered. – September 14, 2017.