The Slumdog inferno: Oscar star Rubina among 2,000 left homeless as fire rips through shanty town


One of the young stars of the Oscar-winning film Slumdog Millionaire was among 2,000 people left homeless after a fire ripped through her shanty town.

Rubina Ali, 12, lost all the awards and newspaper and magazine articles she had kept as mementoes of the 2008 Hollywood film.

Agony: Rubina, who played a young version of one of the two main characters in the movie, inspects the ruins of her shanty town

Agony: Rubina, who played a young version of one of the two main characters in the movie, inspects the ruins of her shanty town

Slumdog Millionaire: Rubina played Latika in Danny Boyle's film, which won eight Oscars

Slumdog Millionaire: Rubina played Latika in Danny Boyle's film, which won eight Oscars

Rubina, who played a young version of one of the two main characters in the movie, was watching television with her family on Friday night when they heard shouts of fire and ran out of their tin-roofed home in the huge Garib Nagar slum in Mumbai.

She said yesterday: ‘It’s all gone. Even my best clothes, everything. My pictures at the Oscars, all my memories – all gone.’

Her father, Rafiq Qureshi, said: ‘We grabbed what we could but the fire spread so fast we couldn’t get back in.’ The family were waiting to move into a new apartment paid for by a trust set up by Slumdog director Danny Boyle.

Rubina was eight when she played the young Latika in the film which won eight Oscars. Mr Boyle had promised he would provide houses in Mumbai for her and her co-star Azharuddin Mohammed Ismail, who played a young Salim.

Azharuddin moved into his new home in July 2009 and Rubina is due to move into an apartment within two months in Bandra, one of Mumbai’s most expensive suburbs.

Meanwhile, police are investigating the cause of the fire, which left 21 people injured.

It also swept through hundreds of tenements near railway tracks close to Rubina’s home, which overlooked a drain near Mumbai’s Bandra train station.

Devastation: The fire rages out of control in the huge Garib Nagar slum in Mumbai

Devastation: The fire rages out of control in the huge Garib Nagar slum in Mumbai

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