The Kuwaiti government will give USD 15,000 (around Rs 12.50 lakh) as compensation to the families of the victims of the devastating fire that broke out in a building housing migrant workers, killing 49 people, including 45 Indians, according to a media report.

Kuwaiti officials said a massive fire broke out on June 12 due to a short circuit in the guard’s room on the ground floor of the seven-storey building in Mangaf, southern Kuwait. The building housed 196 migrant workers, most of them Indians.

The victims’ families will receive compensation on the orders of Kuwait’s Emir Sheikh Meshaal Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah, the Arab Times reports.

The paper quoted Kuwaiti government sources as saying the compensation payments would be processed and delivered to the relevant embassies, including India.

The newspaper said the concerned embassies will ensure that the compensation is distributed to the families of the victims and the aid reaches them quickly.

This compensation will be given to the bereaved families to help them through difficult times.

On June 13, a special IAF aircraft went to Kuwait to pick up the bodies of 45 Indians killed in the fire. The aircraft reached Kochi in Kerala the next day and the bodies were airlifted to the native places of the victims.

Most of the victims (23) were from Kerala, followed by seven from Tamil Nadu, three each from Andhra Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh, two from Odisha, and one each from Maharashtra, Karnataka, Bihar, West Bengal, Punjab, Haryana and Jharkhand.

Meanwhile, Kuwait’s public prosecutor has launched an investigation into the fire tragedy and the probe aims to determine the circumstances behind the incident.

So far, one Kuwaiti citizen and several foreigners have been arrested following the incident on charges of murder and causing hurt due to negligence in safety and security measures.