The driver and a passenger of a car had a close shave when the vehicle they were travelling in caught fire under R.K. Ashram Marg Metro station in central Delhi on Tuesday. The police said that both the driver and other occupant escaped unhurt.

According to the police, the incident took place at about 3:15 pm and brought the traffic on one side of the street to a grinding halt for a while. “A red Skoda Fabia was engulfed in flames moments after the driver (also its owner) and his fellow passenger had exited the car,” a Delhi traffic police official said.

The owner, a resident of Vivek Vihar area in east Delhi, said, “I feel lucky that the two of us escaped just in time,” adding, “I was driving the car and when I smelled something burning, I suspected it must have been short-circuit or something. So, I immediately stopped and parked my car on the roadside, and hurriedly came out of it.”

“I then fetched some water in bottles and tried spraying that on the bonnet but by that time it went up in flames. I then immediately called up the fire service,” the owner said.

Delhi Fire Service personnel arrived at the place around 3:30 pm and doused the flames, even as a huge crowd gathered around the accident site, obstructing traffic flow.

“The front of the car seems to be charred. The cause of the fire will become clear later. Right now, we can’t say anything with certainty as to what led to the fire,” said a senior Delhi fire service official.