A day after torrential rain battered Kolkata, Indian Secular Front MLA Naushad Siddiqui on Wednesday sought an inquiry by the Calcutta High Court into the deaths due to electrocution in Kolkata, the precautionary measures by the Kolkata Municipal Corporation and the West Bengal government, and the compensation for the families of those who died.

Siddiqui’s counsel moved a PIL regarding these before the division bench of Justice Sujoy Kumar Paul and Justice Smita Das De on Wednesday. The court has allowed the matter to be filed.

On Tuesday, as the Calcutta High Court was closed, two organisations had written to the office of the Chief Justice of Calcutta High Court, stating that compensation should be provided to the families, alleging that the deaths were due to the “negligence of the state administration”.

According to the organisations, the administration, the police and the discom “have not learned a lesson” from previous deaths due to electrocution. They requested that the letter be treated as a PIL.

Due to a night-long downpour from Monday, vast portions of the city and its suburbs became inundated. At least nine people have died of electrocution, while one was injured. To prevent further fatalities, CESC, the private power utility that serves Kolkata and its outskirts, disconnected power supply in several pockets of the city.

While West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee held the CESC responsible for the deaths due to electrocution, the CESC asserted the fatalities were unrelated to its distribution network.

“We have investigated eight such cases. We found that in five of these cases, the deaths were caused by electrocution from faulty wiring within homes or a factory. The rest of the three cases happened outside. Two of them were electrocuted from touching street light poles. These street light poles are generally not owned or maintained by CESC. The other case was from a kiosk near a traffic signal,” the CESC said in a statement.