Mumbai: The Centre has ordered an inquiry into the Mahanagar Gas Ltd (MGL) pipeline fire incident three days ago at Andheri in North Mumbai and has decided to penalise those responsible for such an act.

"My ministry has set up an inquiry committee which will investigate all the aspects of this unfortunate incident," Union Minister for Petroleum and Natural Gas Ram Naik said.

The investigation would identify the company for which the third party contractor, who had ripped apart the sensitive pipeline on February 13, and also question the BrihanMumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) over granting permission to the contractors, Naik told reporters on February 15.

"In such cases, the municipality always has plans with them. We will investigate whether the contractor had obtained requisite permission from the BMC or not," he added.

Naik said there was no damage to life and property and natural gas supply has been restored to over 7,000 houses and a few multi-star hotels in the region.

Sources said the third party contractor responsible for the fire is Blue Broadband Ltd, a local contractor. It was using the trenchless technology for laying optic fibre network in the area for an upcoming telecom network major.

"We are very surprised with such an incident as in practice these telecom companies always inform us about their digging plans and also seek our permission beforehand," MGL managing director A K Purvaha said.

PTI