A hire car driver wanted for questioning by the police, endured a fiery death yesterday rather than surrender to the cops who had pursued him.
Krishendat Phagwah ignored the pleas of the law enforcement officers to submit, instead, he set his home on fire and perished in it. The 39-year-old driver, of  363 Fort Ordnance, New Scheme, East Canje , shared a common law relationship with Bibi Nafeeza Khan, 39, her two children, Chyuan Keng, 12, a student
of Berbice High, and Suyun Keng, 11, who attends Sheet Anchor Primary School.
According to a police report , the now deceased was accused of driving away with a gas bottle belonging to a passenger, and was wanted for investigations into a matter of
fraudulent conversion.
This newspaper was informed that  a passenger had hired the car for the day in order to transact several businesses. In the process , a bottle of gas was purchased, and placed
within the trunk of the car .The commuter went to a nearby Chinese restaurant and upon returning to the vehicle, the passenger observed that the car had disappeared.
The observant traveller, who had earlier made a mental note of the car’s registration number,  reported the incident to the police who went in pursuit of the driver.
Khan said she is not aware of any problems that her husband might have had with persons.
According to the distraught woman, her husband, along with her mother ,Bibi Johanan Khan, had moments before taken her sickly step-father,  Arnold Shirkisson , 79,  to the New
Amsterdam Hospital , where he was admitted.
She was at the hospital when she got word that her home was on fire.
On arrival at the scene, the building, which belonged to her mother, was already engulfed in flames.
Her mother arrived soon after and collapsed at the sight of her house on fire.
Meanwhile, neighbours said Phagwah, on arrival at the house at 08:40hrs , had hurriedly, parked his car and quickly entered the  house.
The cops who arrived at the address minutes after, were overheard saying , ‘He has to be in there, we might have to go in and call for back up’.
The observer noted that after police entered the yard, ranks knocked at the front door, but there was no response.
The cops then removed louvre panes , and the wanted man threw kerosene at them, forcing them to retreat.
Additional ranks were summoned, and on their arrival, Phagwah allegedly threw the flammable liquid on them, before setting the window on fire, which was extinguished.
The eyewitness, who spoke on condition of anonymity said , three fires were subsequently lit in the kitchen and two bedrooms in the concrete and wooden house.
During the conflagration, the ranks tried to get into the house but were kept at bay by the heat and smoke.
By the time fire tenders from the Rose Hall Estate and the New Amsterdam Fire stations, arrived, the house was already gutted.