The fire was spotted at 1:30pm at the Jahuri Mahalla slum near Babar Road when Dhaka City Corporation (DCC) was carrying out a drive against unauthorised shops and thatched houses home to around 250 people.

The slum dwellers alleged police set fire to the shanties as it was taking 'too long' for them to vacate their houses.

"They (police) cut off the gas pipeline which might have caused the fire," said M Kawsar Ali, an evicted slum dweller.

Some others said the fire started when police tore some live wires off a nearby electric pole. One of them, Shahnaz, described, "Police cut off the electric wires after locals pelted them with stones."

But the police officers strongly denied the allegations. One of them said, "We were just present at the scene as the DCC people were bulldozing the unauthorised shops and houses."

"Police can't jump that high to cut wires hanging from a pole. How can torn wires create fire?" said another police officer.

DCC Magistrate M Giasuddin, who was present at the spot, denied the allegations too, saying: "Somehow the fire started and now they are trying to shift the blame onto us."

A victim of the fire, Bakul Begum, said, "They didn't give us time to remove the belongings from our houses." She also claimed the police did not permit her to go near the rubble to salvage her things.